


Paternity Problems

by BellaKatrina



Category: Blindspot (TV), Strike Back
Genre: Allie is My Spirit Animal, Condoms Are Your Friend!, Conor Has An Actual Personality, Cousins, Crack Crossover, Crossover, Cursing So Much Cursing, Damien is a Dog, Don't Take Me Seriously I Don't, Explicit Language, Exploding Brownies, F/M, Family, Friendship, Gen, Humor, Kurt You ARE The Father!, Someone Page Maury Povich, alls well that ends well
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-22
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-10-26 06:43:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 24,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20737922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BellaKatrina/pseuds/BellaKatrina
Summary: Surely everyone has noticed by now how similar Kurt Weller and Damien Scott are in appearance but not personality? Yeah... Kurt really should have told people that he had an identical cousin running around loose on the world. Especially the women in his life. Might have prevented a few small problems. And shenanigans. But mostly problems. Especially problems that come to a head during Jane's bachelorette party.





	1. Why Is 'Girls Night Out' at 2 PM on a Sunday in a Coffee Shop?

**Author's Note:**

> Rating for language. Allie has quite a potty mouth on her, so do some of the other characters. Written a while ago, so some of the pairings are a bit outdated (*cough* Sarah/Reade *cough*). Implied past pairings may make some people raise a judgmental eyebrow, but past relationships are past and will not interfere with Jane/Kurt endgame.

Tasha stomps into the coffee shop, and practically tears her scarf off after she slams her purse down on the table top. "Why the hell are we having 'girls' night out' at 2 pm on a Sunday in a coffee shop?" She demands to know. She quickly looks over the table, noticing the _two_ cups of coffee in front of Allie. "And since when have you taken to double-fisting coffee?"

Allie takes another large gulp from one of the cups of coffee in front of her, rolling her eyes. "Because I have a five-month-old who seems to be _allergic_ to sleep and I need all the caffeine in the greater NYC metro area. I swear to God, I thought all humans despite size and age _had_ to sleep at some point or die, but I was apparently wrong. Because Conor and Kurt guilt-tripped me into breastfeeding and I can't have alcohol. Because Kurt would kill me deader than dead if I took our daughter to your favorite bar. Pick an answer, any answer."

Bethany apparently picks up on her mother's aggravated tones and starts shrieking. Everyone in the store turns to glare at them.

Allie carries on like she can't even hear the screaming, ranting about the unfairness of the world and questioning why everyone had lied to her about the number of hours that babies sleep. Tash tilts her head slightly to the side, trying to see if Allie's wearing ear plugs, as it's the only logical answer she can think of as to how the other woman is ignoring the nonstop caterwauling coming out of Bethany's tiny mouth; she's clearly inherited her father's ability to bellow.

"Does she ever stop?" Tash finally cuts off Allie's rant, and despite all of her survival instincts telling her not to, reaches over to the baby carrier and picks the kid up, giving her a quick whiff. There’re clearly no obvious diaper-related reasons for the baby to be screaming so. "Should you feed her or something?" She holds the baby out at arm's length, trying to hand her over to Allie.

"Tried that about ten minutes before you showed." Allie gulps coffee again. "Didn't seem to be the wanted thing then. Didn't want me to hold her or touch her or even look at her, so don't give me one of those 'you're the worst mom in the world' looks, Tash. I'm doing the best I can."

The baby clearly doesn't want to be held by her either, so Tash can't fault the other woman, and settles instead on putting Bethany back down in her carrier. Maybe Patty or Jane would have more luck, if they ever got there. "Where are the other two? I thought I'd be the last one here."

"Some sort of brownie-related disaster." Allie offers, wrinkling her nose. "Something about not knowing that brownies could actually explode? Didn't sound like something I wanted to know more about."

"Exploding brownies, and _that_ doesn't interest you? Fuck, I want to know more, about the brownies _and_ the explosion."

Bethany coos, an odd sound very different from all the screaming, and both women stop to peer into the carrier then look at each other.

"Do babies eat brownies?" Tash asks. "None of my brothers' kids have, but…"

Allie looks equally baffled. "Maybe she has Kurt's sweet tooth?" She picks up her daughter, and coos at her. "Do you want a brownie, sweetheart? Do you? Do you?"

The baby crosses her eyes and grabs at her foot.

Allie just shrugs. "I don't know, I still can't read baby body language. That could be 'feed me brownies', but it's equally as likely to be 'fuck off, bitch'."

At that, Bethany giggles and coos again.

"Okay, this is getting weird. The doctor said not to give her solids for a few more months, do you think we could put a brownie in the blender with a little breast milk?" Allie looks over at Tash, clearly seriously considering the idea.

"Yeah, if you thought Kurt would kill you for taking her to a bar, what do you think he'd do to us if we started feeding her processed sugars and trans fats and all the other tasty stuff at this age?" Tash shakes her head. "I love you like a sister, but I'm not willing to die for one of your dumbass ideas."

"It's not that dumb!" Allie tries to defend herself. "Okay, when I suggested that we bring her to the jail where they're holding Rich DotCrazyFuck and let her scream herself out for a little session of sound torture so that he could enjoy it just as much as I've been enjoying it, that was a dumb idea, but you have _no clue_ about the problems we've been having feeding her. She doesn't want the breast, she doesn't want a bottle, she doesn't want formula, _nothing_. If she's willing to eat a brownie, I'm on board."

"You might want to hold off until she at least has teeth." Tash points out, realizing that Allie's more than a little crazed from lack of sleep and desperation.

The baby starts screaming again and Allie closes her eyes. "Two more days. Two more days. Kurt and Jane are going to take her for a week in just two more days. I can survive two more fucking days."

The screams settle down into delighted giggles, and the strangest idea pops up into Tash's head. Tash has to wonder if maybe Allie's not the crazy one at the table. "Allie, how often do you cuss in front of the baby?"

"Almost never." She's quick to answer. "Conor and Kurt and my mother are on this big trip about how they don't want her first word to be an obscenity and how they'd like it if she didn't start cursing like me until at least middle school."

Tasha leans over the baby carrier, looks the kid right in the eye, and softly whispers "fuck". The effect is instant. Bethany is all smiles and giggles and, from all appearances, the happiest child in the world. Tash has to laugh as she looks back over at her best friend. "Yeah, good fucking luck with that. I don't think she was so delighted with those exploding brownies as we thought she was."

"Well, fuck me." Allie looks totally dumbfounded. "That's the answer to keeping her happy? Just talking like I normally do instead of all this baby-friendly sanitized language shit?" She gently picks her daughter back up and cuddles her close to her, and Tasha can see her lips moving in a stream of near-silent curses.

"I guess she got used to hearing you talk while in the womb?" Tash ventures a guess.

"Don't ever let Kurt hear you suggest anything of the like." Allie glares at her. "Do you have any clue what he's going to do when he realizes his baby's favorite word is 'fuck'? Do you? It's not going to be pretty. And if he knows I'm responsible for it happening in fucking utero…" She whistles low.

"Well, he had to have known it was a possibility." Tasha points out. "If he didn't want a cursing baby, then maybe he should have been more careful about fucking around with _you_."

"Fair." Allie nods. "Very fair. Valid point."

Tasha almost bites her tongue, knowing that the questions she has aren't at all appropriate to ask, but she can't imagine a more perfect time, and really the curiosity's been killing her and Jane's not there yet, so she might not ever get a better opportunity. "Okay, I've been good. I've been really good about not asking, but I just _have_ to know. What the fuck happened between you two?"

Allie shifts the baby so she can hold her with one arm and cradle another cup of coffee in her free hand. She doesn't make eye contact with Tash when she finally answers. "You know how we used to be. Good chemistry, no substance. Nothing really changed about that. Only thing that changed was us. He needed someone that wasn't me, and I got tired of being used as a Jane substitute." She tries to change the subject. "Don't you want to get yourself some coffee?"

"Nah, I'll wait until Patty and Jane get here, we can all order together." Tash waves her off. "We all kind of had _that_ figured, Als. I meant what happened with you and Mr. Super Careful Boy Scout to end up with a kid. _No way_ it was intentional, and I do mean that for both of you. I know you weren't planning on having kids yet. I get the impression he's never wanted kids, and he's the most fastidious condom user I've ever encountered."

Allie lifts an eyebrow but doesn't say anything for a few seconds. "I'd just about forgotten about that. You might not want to say that in front of Jane."

"I'm not _stupid_ and it's really not worth mentioning. Ancient irrelevant history." Tasha points out. "But seriously, what the fuck, Als?"

The baby coos and giggles again, interrupting them, and they look at each other and laugh.

"Okay, this is fucking hilarious." Allie points out. "I honestly thought it was Kurt's 'angry at the world' genes coming out to play and that she was never going to be happy. Who knew? I can't wait to show this little trick to Conor, he's going to adore having a happy, giggly child. Here, make yourself useful for once and get out your phone. I want to send some pictures and vids to Conor and Kurt." She plays with the baby for awhile, getting all sorts of smiles and giggles and coos out of her daughter, and Tash does as she's told.

After a few minutes, Tasha has another brain storm. "Hey, did you hear about that 'Go the Fuck to Sleep' book a few years ago? I wonder if that could help with your little no-sleeping problem?"

Allie's eyes light up in glee. "I could kiss you, you're just that brilliant. We'll try it just as soon as we get home, but until then…" She rocks the baby slightly and whispers softly in her ear for a few minutes, and Tash is just as amazed as she is as the baby's eyes start blinking closed.

They don't say a word as Allie puts her back in the carrier, rocking it gently with her foot for a few more minutes.

"Holy shit!" Allie looks over at her and mouths the words.

"I know!" Tash mouths back, and they both start laughing.

Allie looks down at her phone, then frowns. "Okay, this is getting ridiculous, they're a solid hour late now." 

"Exploding." Tasha points out. "Brownies."

"Point taken."

They giggle slightly again, before Allie sighs. "Okay, since we don't have anything else to do while we wait, I guess if you really must know…"

"Oh, I must." Tasha nods enthusiastically. "Als, seriously. It's _me_. Who else could you possibly talk to about this shit?"

"You were mostly right about how careful he is. But there was one night…" She trails off and looks over at Tash earnestly. "I know your thing was one weekend like a decade ago and you said it was super boringly vanilla, but are you aware of him being into role-play at all? Has Jane said anything?"

Tasha is thrilled she doesn't have anything to drink, because she's fairly certain she would have ended up snorting hot coffee up her nose over that question. "Are you _kidding_ me? One, Jane would _never_ say anything about that. Two, fuck, Jane's entire life is a role-play, there's no way they're getting up to _more_ role-playing in the bedroom. Three, _yeah right_. Fairly certain that's not his thing."

"_Right_?!" Allie nods. "But it happened. Strangest fucking thing ever. For someone that we can't even picture _thinking_ about it, he was super into it and _good_ at it. Never broke character even once. He was like some sort of super great actor."

"No. Way." Tasha shakes her head. "You should have seen and heard him when we had to do some acting for this Sandstorm thing. He's awful. Definitely not a great actor."

"Yes way. I told you, it was weird! There wasn't a single trace of his usual Kurt-ness about him. You know what I mean." Allie waves her hands around. "All smiles and laughter and cursing and none of that 'woe is me, my life sucks' attitude or the usual intensity. Swear to God, Tash, it was like he was another person."

Tasha just stares at her, confused, not able to even imagine anything of the sort.

"I _know_." Allie smiles at the memory. "I'd asked him to meet me at McGuire's because the Marshals were hosting an after-work thing there, he said he couldn't because you all were working late, but he showed up after all. He acted like he'd never met me before, seemed really enthusiastic about using some lame-ass lines and picking me up – and not his usual type of lame-ass lines. His normal shit is just _sad_, but these were the type that could get other less-hot guys slapped. Gave me a fake name even, Scott, and took me to some hotel instead of back to his place. Swear to God, Tash, he somehow even looked hotter than normal! Something about the look in his eyes."

Tasha continues to just stare at her.

"I know, trust me, _I know_." Allie grins wickedly at her. "And he didn't use any of his usual lame-ass sex moves either! And for the first time _ever_, he didn't have a single condom with him and said that he just couldn't wait long enough to have some delivered, he had to have me right that very second."

"Bullshit. I'm calling bullshit right now." Tasha finally finds her voice, albeit her weak and shaky voice. "That didn't happen. You've made up some crazy-ass story to see how gullible I am."

"I'll swear on anything you'd like me to swear on." Allie holds up her fingers in their personal inside-joke of a Boy Scout's pledge gesture. "I'm telling you the truth, the entire truth."

"Holy shit." Tasha's mind is completely blown by that.

"_I know_." Allie agrees. "And do you know the even more bizarre part of it? He snuck out in the night, settled the hotel bill, and then pretended he didn't know what I was talking about when I mentioned the bar the next day at lunch. We settled back into the same ol' boring routine after that and he never mentioned it or tried it again. I dumped him about a week later, when he took up the exceptionally obnoxious habit of screaming out 'Jane' and _crying_ when he came. So _annoying_. I figure it had to have happened then, since condoms are kinda important and our dumb asses didn't use any those five times."

"Five!?!" Tasha doesn't mean to shriek, but does. She chooses to ignore the rest of the info Allie's just dumped on her.

"Five." Allie smiles like the cat who ate the canary. "Bless the man. He's set a standard Conor's determined to meet, or die trying. Best thing that ignorant slut's ever done for me. Well, the baby's kinda great too, now that we figured out how to operate the off-switch for the screaming."

Tash's mouth moves a few times, but she can't find the words to say. She knows she has to look like a guppy, but she's okay with that for right now. It takes her a while to find the words, but she finally settles on "That's fucking weird. All of it. So _weird_."

Patty and Jane walk up just in time to catch Tash's comment. "What's weird?" Patty asks as she takes her coat off.

Allie shrugs the question off. "New baby thing. You don't want to know."

Patty raises one eyebrow at her in the classic 'I don't believe a word you're saying, Als' glance, then looks over at Tasha for confirmation.

"You really don't want to know. Very much baby-related. And on that topic, you won't believe the other weird baby trick we figured out waiting on you two."

"It'll have to wait until later." Allie cuts in. "She's still asleep and we're not waking her up for anything short of Armageddon."

"Oh, I like that movie!" Jane exclaims as she hugs Allie in greeting. "Kurt says it's unscientific nonsense, but I like it."

"That's not what she meant, honey." Patty softly explains. "But it's a religion thing, so ask Kurt. You know he said he'll take all the religious questions." She quickly changes the topic. "Wait, she's actually sleeping for once?"

"_I know_!" Allie and Tash say at the same time.

Allie continues speaking. "Jane, why do you smell like chocolate and gun powder?"

"Don't ask." Patty cuts her off. "Just don't. I can't go through it again right now."

Jane bites her lip, looking sheepish. "I told you already, Kurt and I will pay for the damage."

Patty waves her off. "I was looking for a good excuse to remodel that kitchen. Or move, moving works. Especially since I'm fairly certain I'm going to get evicted now. Don't worry about it, you two need to save your money for the wedding. I'm going to go get a mocha, what can I bring back for everyone?"


	2. The Saddest Bachelorette Party Ever

"This," Tasha complains, moving a disapproving finger in a circle pointing around the apartment's cramped living room, "is the saddest bachelorette party _ever_."

"Tasha!" Patterson scolds.

"She's right." Allie fake-yawns. "Hell, even most women kidnapped and dragged around by the hair by barbarians having better hen nights than this!"

Jane blushes at her words, and Tasha and Allie both whoop loudly with laughter.

"Will you two please behave!" Patterson tries scolding them again before turning back to Jane. "It's okay, honey, you can have whatever type of party you want to have, ignore them."

"Patty, sweetheart, baby, you sweet innocent summer child…" Allie starts laughing before she can finish her train of thought.

Tasha finishes it for her. "That's not why she's blushing. Please don't make us explain it to you. Because you _know_ what will happen when Als starts talking."

Patty clearly doesn't get the joke, but Sarah does and has a full-body shudder. "Ew. Could you _please_ just _not_?"

"You're the one that decided to come to your brother's fiancée's bachelorette party." Allie points out. "Which includes two or more women who've had _very_ nasty _wild_ monkey sex with your brother. What did you _think_ we were going to be discussing, what shade of pink to wear on Wednesday? The ten steps to world peace? That really awesome pie recipe in last month's 'Redbook'. C'mon now, Sarah, we already have two innocent virgins here tonight, we don't need three."

"Two or more who had Kurt? _Or more_?" Patty calls her out on what she'd just said. "Also, _two_ innocent virgins? _What_ are you talking about?"

"I assume she means the baby for one and then was implying you were the second since you didn't get the joke about Kurt's tendency to go all cavemannish in the bedroom." Tasha quickly covers Allie's mistake. "Seriously, how drunk are you Als? You've reached the stage of forgetting how to count _already_?"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, fuck you too." Allie sticks up her middle finger in Tasha's direction. "How's about _you_ get pregnant and then breastfeed for like _forever_ and not having any alcohol in…" she tries counting it up on her fingers, but fails. "A really really fucking long time, I don't even know how long now. And then instead of easing back into it gently with a glass of wine or something, you split a bottle of tequila with Jane. See you well you keep your shit together then and get back to me."

Sarah laughs. "Yeah, that first drink after Sawyer was _bad_. Kurt had to carry me home from dinner, and I did just have a single glass of white wine. So embarrassing."

"See!" Allie gets up from her spot on the sofa to hug Sarah. "She knows what it's like. She knows what babies with Weller family genes do to your alcohol tolerance levels!"

Tasha nudges Jane with her elbow, grinning widely at her. "The moral of this after-school session is don't get pregnant. You like liquor too much."

"No matter what Kurt says or does, just don't do it! Condoms are your friend!" Allie nods frantically. "Believe me when I tell you it's something you want no part of. And we haven't said a word about what it's going to do to your tits and cunt. Hint: nothing good!" She looks at Jane for a second, then reconsiders. "Well, as flat as you are, letting that ignorant slut knock you up might actually be a good thing for your breasts. You might actually get some if that happens. Although plastic surgery would be cheaper in the long run, and _that_ comes without a shitting, puking crying machine that you have to put through college since we really don't want her to become a topless dancer. But you know, she'll probably have bigger breasts than you by age like twelve or something." Allie knocks back the rest of her drink.

Tasha and Sarah both choke on their drinks.

"Allie!" Jane admonishes.

"Guys, play nice and could you _please_ watch your language?!" Patty tries calming them down again. "Jane, don't listen to them. They're more than a little tipsy." She glares at Tasha, hissing at her "Why did you let Allie drink so much?"

"Um, because there's nothing else to do?" Tash points out. "I'm not joking about this being the most boring party ever, Patty. There's nothing here but booze. There's no cake because _someone_ made the mistake of letting Jane into the kitchen again." She glares at Patty for a second, because _really_, the woman should have known better by now. "No obscene decorations. No activities. No gifts to unwrap. Hell, we don't even have a male stripper to ogle! And she had like two shots max spread out over several mixed drinks. How was I supposed to know that she can't handle them as well as her usual eight????"

"You know Kurt wouldn't approve of strippers, not with Jane, Baby Bee, and Sarah here. And there's Parcheesi!" Patty tries to defend her party-planning skills. "And I have some fun carbonated mud masks and sparkly finger nail polish if we want to give each other manicures and facials. Or, oh, this would be fun – pedicures!"

A knock at the door distracts them all from having to respond to Patty's attempts to make drunken pedicures sound like a good thing and not a recipe for disaster.

Jane looks up, suspicious. "Als, tell me you didn't."

"I didn't!" Allie swears. "What, what is it I didn't do? There's a _slight_ chance I did. Actually… well… you know me. There's really not much that I actually _wouldn't_ do, so yeah, there's a very good chance that I have at some point. Wait, what are we talking about again?"

Tasha just cackles. "I know what you're thinking, Jane, and she didn't. I didn't either. None of us want to deal with Kurt having an absolute shit-fit over you seeing some stranger's cock."

Sarah holds up her hands in surrender. "I wouldn't have a clue where to even start in figuring out how to request a man to come over and take off his clothes and dance badly for money."

"Google." Patty promptly answers without thinking, then notices the shocked looks that they all give her then. "_What_? There's nothing on the face of this earth that Google doesn't know! I didn't say that _I_ Googled how to hire a male stripper! I would never!"

Whomever's at the door knocks again, harder this time.

"Someone should probably get that." Tasha drawls, sipping her drink. "And it's sure as fuck not going to be _me_, just in case it _is_ a stripper. Or worse yet, Rich DotCom acting like a stripper."

"Not me!" Jane, Allie, and Patty all quickly call out, obviously disturbed by her train of thought.

Sarah just rolls her eyes and gets up. "I'm the most sober one here anyhow, and it is my brother's place. I guess I'll do it." They all watch her walk towards the door.

"Quick, before she gets to it, for reals – did anyone order a guy? I didn't." Tasha asks.

Everyone shakes their heads no.

"Oh my God!" Sarah screams when she opens the door.

Patty just sighs. "Als, tell me you didn't."

"I _didn't_! How many times do I have to say it?" Allie glares at them as Sarah screams again, clearly happy and excited about _something_. "I kinda resent the fact that you all assume I'm the one who did."

"Resemble, Als. You kinda _resemble_ the fact we think you're that type of woman." Patty pats her on the head as she gets up and walks towards where Sarah's still standing at the door.

"Oh my God!" Patty shrieks when she gets to the door, and they all turn to look at her. She doesn't seem nearly as happy as Sarah, just confused and surprised.

"No, I meant what I said. I'm sure." Allie nods her head emphatically.

"Jesus, she's wasted. Jane, you deal with her. I'm going to go see what the fuck's going on here." Tasha pushes herself up and saunters towards the entry way, shaking her head at Allie's antics. She's not expecting to see a pale Patty standing there with her mouth hanging open in shock, staring as Sarah frantically hugs someone. The words tumble out of her mouth before she can think. "What the hell?"

Sarah and the stranger spin slightly, and Tasha can see that the guy is supporting Sarah with just one arm around her waist. Whomever this guy is, he's strong, she can tell that already. Both of Sarah's arms are clinched tightly around his neck. Sarah finally gets done pressing kisses against his cheeks and rests her head on his shoulder, addressing Tash and Patty. "Guys, it's Damien! Oh, I can't believe you made it! I thought you weren't going to get here until the actual wedding day! This is so wonderful!"

Tasha has to put a hand out on the wall to support herself when she realizes that this Damien guy is an exact duplicate of Kurt, all except for the length of his hair. "Holy _fuck_, no one ever told us Weller had a twin! _Why_ did no one ever tell us that he has a _twin_!?!?" She wonders if she sounds as hysterical as she feels.

"Don't be silly, Tash." Sarah admonishes her before squeezing Damien tightly again. "Now, put me down, you big lug, I need to introduce you to everyone!"

He slowly lowers her to the ground, but doesn't let go of the hold he has on her, and then holds out his other hand in Tash's direction. "Hey, there, gorgeous! Call me Scott, not Damien. And I'm not Kurtie's twin, I'm their cousin! Where is the little fucker, anyways?"

"Oh, fuck me." There's a horrible pit in the bottom of her stomach.

He grins at her, dimples appearing. "Well, if you insist… It would definitely be my pleasure. And yours."

"Damien!" Sarah scolds him. "Act like a gentleman."

"Fine." He smiles at her again, winking this time. "Let me buy you a drink first. What do you like, just for future reference? A Screaming Orgasm or three? Sex on a Beach?"

"Oh, fuck _me_." Tasha knows that's not at all the appropriate response, but she doesn't know what else to say.

Patty starts cackling and giggling nervously, and he turns his attention on her. "Well, aren't you just the sweetest little thing ever? What's _your_ name, honey?" He reaches over and pushes back a lock of hair that had fallen over her face, tucking it behind her ear.

"Damien, please stop hitting on my friends and Kurt's coworkers, it's _disgusting_." Sarah smacks him on the shoulder. "Don't act like a pig."

"Fine, I'll beh…" He trails off in mid-sentence as Jane and Allie join them. "Yeah, I'm not going to make promises I can't keep, Sassy. Hey there, darlings, I'm Scott. Which one of you is the one dumb enough to marry my baby cousin?"

Jane slowly raises her hand, eyes wide as she takes in the scene.

"Well, fuck _me_, but he landed a hottie." Scott grins at her. "I do hate to hear that you're off-limits. Are you sure I can't convince you to run away with me instead? I sure would like to find out how far down those tattoos go." He eyes the neckline of her shirt with interest.

Sarah smacks him again. "Damien! _No_!"

"Oh dear God." Allie quickly slaps her hand over her mouth, like she could use it to somehow keep from blurting out anything else.

"Hey, I know you!" Scott smiles again, and Tasha can see exactly what she meant when Allie had said that 'Kurt' had acted without a single trace of his usual Kurt-ness to him; his cousin, for all that he's an almost identical copy to Kurt, is a polar opposite in attitude. This is about to get _very_ ugly if she's right in her assumptions. "Allie, isn't it? We met last time I was in town!"

"When was that?" Sarah asks, seemingly confused. "Allie never came over for any of the family dinners with you, Mikey, Finn, and Ester when she was dating Kurt."

"Oh dear _God_." Allie repeats, her voice an octave higher than it had been earlier.

Before anyone can say anything else, the baby starts crying in the back room that Kurt had set up as the nursery.

Tasha reacts before Allie can. "I need to go check on the baby, Allie why don't you come with me?" She knows that she's giving this Scott-Damien- manwhore-cousin the false impression that Bethany is _her_ baby, and she's _more_ than okay with that, because she's not about to be the one to tip all of them off to the little soap opera that's currently unfolding during Jane's bachelorette party. She grabs Allie by the elbow and drags her down the hallway to the nursery, shutting the door behind them and locking it.

"Oh dear God." Allie repeats again, and Tasha is simultaneously pleased that she's not having a loud nervous breakdown and concerned that Allie hasn't quite put one and one together to equal three yet.

"Keep it together, Als." Tasha hugs her tightly, then releases her when the baby screams again. Allie is clearly in no shape to handle baby care, so Tasha picks up her goddaughter and quickly realizes the problem. She decides to not say anything for the three minutes it's going to take to change that diaper, giving Allie time to do a cognitive re-boot and get her mind back right.

Once Bethany's clean and freshly diapered, Tasha tries to hand her over to Allie. Allie cringes, and Tasha changes her mind and decides the crib's the proper place for the baby to wait out the drama.

"I cheated." Allie whispers.

Tasha tries to comfort her. "You didn't know."

"I've never cheated in my life," Allie whispers again, "and I fucking cheated on _Kurt_, of all people. Of all the guys, and there's been a _lot_, he was the best, the purest, the most _decent_, and I _cheated_ on him. I went out to a bar while I was dating him, drank too much, went to a hotel room with a _stranger_, and fucked him."

"Shhhh, it's okay," Tasha wraps her arms around her, pulling her close. "You didn't cheat. You didn't know. It wasn't intentional. You thought he was Kurt. That's not the same as cheating, it's _really_ not, Als. It's okay. You weren't trying to hurt him. It's not the same. What you just described is _not_ the full story of what happened. You know that."

"I've done a lot of shitty things, I mean a _lot_ of super shitty horrible things, but I've never cheated on a man. Not even in high school." Allie mumbles into her shoulder.

"Not cheating, Als. Not cheating." Tasha rocks her slightly.

"You can't tell him." Allie pulls back and looks at her, panicked. "You can't."

"I'm not going to say a word to him about the baby, I promise." Tasha swears. "If you don't want him to know, we'll find some way to play it off."

Any color that was left in Allie's face blanches away, and her voice is haunted as she repeats Tash's words. "The baby."

Tasha sickly realizes that _that's_ not what Allie meant, that she wasn't worried about Scott finding out about her daughter. "_Fuck_."

Allie looks like she might throw up. "I cheated on Kurt. I told you I thought _that_ was the night I got pregnant with Bee. I slept with his fucking _cousin_ that night. Tasha…"

"No, I'm sure you got your dates wrong, you were already pregnant when he tricked you, not that he intended to trick you, that's not what I'm saying, this is all just a bad mishap." Tasha tries to talk her out of this line of thought, mostly because she can tell it's going to be what pushes Allie over the edge and she desperately wants to get Allie and Bethany out of Kurt's apartment before that happens.

"Tasha, please tell me that I've not been lying to Kurt and falsely telling him that my daughter is his for the last year. Oh, this is _so_ fucked up." Allie's shaking as she says it.

"You've not intentionally lied to him. You've not. It's okay, Als." Tasha quickly pushes Allie over to where Kurt had set a rocking chair, and gets her seated in it, pushing her head down towards her knees. "Just breathe."

"It's going to kill Kurt to find out, even if I'm wrong and she actually _is_ his and not Scott's. Just the very idea that it's a fucking possibility is going to hurt him, and I never wanted that." Allie sits up, looking stricken. "Oh God, what have I fucking _done_?"

"Hey, guys? Could you open the door?" Patty's voice is faint through the closed and locked door.

"Should I? You going to be ok?" Tash asks as she heads towards the door, pausing to get Allie's approval before she twists the knob.

Allie shrugs.

It's a good enough answer, and Tasha opens the door long enough for Patty to dart in. She looks shaken, albeit not as badly as Allie. "Thanks, I had to get out of there. He wouldn't stop hitting on me, and it's _creepy_!"

Allie laughs, bitterly.

"Ignore her." Tasha instructs Patty.

Patty looks at Allie, at Tash, back at Allie and then at the crib, then back to the door. Her mouth moves into a perfectly round circle as she softly mutters "Oh".

"Yeah, _oh_." Allie closes her eyes. "You figured it out pretty quickly."

"Well, yeah, but I'm not exactly what anyone would call slow." Patty retorts. "So what are we going to do?"


	3. Some Sort of Psycho Slumber Party Stunt

"We hadn't exactly got that far." Tasha summarizes. "We were still going over how it's not Allie's fault."

"Well, duh." Patty crisply states. "Of course it's not your fault. You clearly didn't know that Kurt had a lookalike running around in New York. None of us did – we didn't know about the lookalike part, Sarah apparently thought he's been in Africa or Asia for the last few years so she didn't know to warn you either. It's not like you got pregnant on purpose. So are we telling Kurt first and then DNA testing, or vice versa?"

Allie and Tash look at each other. "You're taking this surprisingly well," Allie accuses. "What gives?"

"What other option is there?" Patty asks calmly. "I'm not going to slut-shame you for anything you do, you know that. I'm not involved in any way shape or form other than as your friend and Kurt's. Not my kid, and neither of them is my man – and let me just say how happy I am about that. That cousin is some sort of… I don't know… gigolo! I don't have anything at stake here. Besides, I know you well enough to know that you're not going to just pretend that nothing happened and just ignore the situation. You're going to tell Kurt at some point, the only question is when."

Allie groans. "I guess I kinda have to tell Kurt, don't I? Fuuuuuuuck." She drags the last word out, closing her eyes as she does. "I understand my mom so much better now."

"What?" Patty asks, clearly confused. She stumbles all over her next words. "Was there some question about… not that I'm saying… your mom… never mind."

"She always told me that two people can have a secret, but three people have a problem." Allie explains. "I always thought it was just an Irish mob thing, but nope, she was trying to warn me not to sleep with my fuck buddy's identical-but-better-in-the-sack cousin. I really wish she'd been more specific, could have saved us all a bunch of trouble."

Tasha tries her best not to laugh, because it's really not a laughing matter right now, but fails. "Yeah, well… first step is admiting we have a problem, second step is accepting it, third step is to figure out what the fuck to do about Kurt."

"Yeah. And it'd be better coming from you than letting him figure it out on his own." Patty states. "Besides, he's not quite as fast as we are at puzzles. Knowing him, he won't figure it out until some really inopportune time, like when he's saying his vows or something, and then he'll have his typical over-reaction and do something stupid, like punching his slutty cousin during the ceremony, which will just upset Jane."

Allie looks over to Tash for advice, and Tash has to nod. "No lies detected. You know how he is."

"Maybe I can spin it to him as a good thing?" Allie leans her head back against the rocker, staring at the ceiling. "Like a 'I know you never wanted kids, and you now don't because I'm a big ol' ho-bag!' or 'surprise, Kurt, I didn't ruin your chances at starting your family with Jane!' or 'I know you wanted Jane to be the mother of your first-born, now she can be, because guess what, I was wrong!' or 'I got you a wedding present, an all-expenses paid honeymoon trip! I fucked your cousin for funsies, now we're all going to the Maury Show for a rousing round of You're Not the Father!' Which of those sounds best?"

"Ehh…" Tasha stalls as she looks over at Patty. "We'll need to work on the phrasing, those all kinda suck. What do you need for a paternity test, Patty?"

Patty bites her lip, thinking about it. "Ideally, cheek swabs from Bee, Kurt, and the fuckboy in the living room."

"Patty!" Tasha yelps, torn between laughter and pure shock. "I didn't even know you knew that word!"

Patty just looks at her, rolling her eyes. "I'm over 30, single, and blonde. Believe me when I tell you I've encountered my fair share of fuckboys, and am more than capable of spotting one when he's sitting next to me and his hand is on my thigh. Als? What do you want to do?"

"I don't want to tell him." Allie argues. "Not unless we're sure she's his instead of Kurt's. It's bad enough I have to tell Kurt that there's a really large chance that Bee's not his, but I think I can do it without telling him who I suspect is her sperm donor. I don't want to cause some sort of family fight if it can be avoided."

"I could work with samples from just two of them." Patty sighs. "I have to agree with you on the family fight thing, that would be really bad especially right now with the wedding and everything."

"Baby's easy to get." Tash points out. "That just leaves which one of the doppelgangers do we want to test? Or could you test Sarah? Maybe look for the difference between an aunt and a second cousin?"

"I think she'd be a first cousin once removed instead of a second cousin," Patty frowns, thinking about it. "That could work, but it won't be able to give you any sense of certainty. Maybe we could bump up to a level where you'd be comfortably sure you knew if she's Kurt's or not if we test Sawyer too."

"Yeah, because that's a kid that knows how to keep secrets." Allie rolls her eyes. "Could we just wait until Jane and Kurt have a kid, and then test both babies to see if they're half-siblings?"

"Seriously?" Tasha smacks her slightly across the back of the head. "We're not doing that. No. Besides, that could take years. Assuming it ever happens. You have to tell Kurt before then – that's like 'hey, you know your sixteen-year-old daughter? Ha ha ha, funny story there…' No, Als."

"How drunk do you think we'd have to get him to get Prince Charming out there to let us take a sample without questioning it too much or noticing?" Allie asks. "Maybe we can still do this without telling anyone anything until we have some answers."

Tasha counters with "How drunk do you think we'd have to get Sarah and Jane not to notice that we're taking a DNA sample from him? There's no other reason we'd be gloved up and swabbing out his mouth and then bagging it. There's no way to hide it. It's just not possible. None of us are talented enough with our tongues to hide a test stick in our mouths and swab him during a make-out session, so don't even suggest it, I know you're thinking it. Besides, ewwww, no. Unless we could get by with a hair follicle? I might be able to pull one without anyone noticing."

"Fuck. Jane and Sarah." Allie curses. "What are the chances that they haven't noticed something's up yet?"

"Um… zero?" Patty comments. "They definitely already noticed. Jane did at least. She stopped Sarah from saying something about how the baby is Allie's or Kurt's, just that it didn't seem right to exclude anyone from the bachelorette party and then started babbling about the wedding in an attempt to distract him. You know Jane never babbles, she has to know something's wrong."

"Fuck." Allie and Tash curse at the same time. 

"That's it, the jig's up." Allie gets up and starts pacing. "There's no way she's not telling Kurt the first chance she gets. There's no way she'll keep this type of secret from him. Even if she doesn't know for sure what's going on, she knows enough and we're back to the 'him figuring it out on his own' thing."

"That's not fair, Als." Patty objects. 

"It is!" Allie retorts back as she paces back towards them. "It's nothing against Jane, I'm not saying that she'll do it to be malicious, I'm just saying that those two don't keep any secrets between them any more. And if she does hold off a day or two to give me time to do the right thing, well, Sarah's still a loose cannon and we don't know what she's going to say and who the fuck she's going to say it to and not even realize what she's doing."

"Call him." Tasha finally states, finally voicing what she's been thinking for the last ten minutes. "It's better coming from you. Just go ahead, call him and Conor right now, and get them over here and we'll just go ahead and have it out in the open." 

Patty and Allie both look at her like she's lost her mind. "How drunk are you?" Allie asks. "Because that's a fucking horrible plan."

"What, and you think trying to con that man into letting you get a DNA sample is a less crazy plan? Can't you just picture it, him passed out on the couch, all of us gathered around him trying to stick a q-tip in his mouth without waking him up, like some sort of psycho slumber party stunt or something you'd see on 'Designing Women'?" Tasha throws up her hands. "News flash: that plan is definitely not less crazy. It really, really isn't!"

Allie whimpers, then takes a deep breath. "I really hate to ask this, but can one of you please take one for the team and get Scott out of here before Kurt shows up?"

"Oh, hells no." Tasha quickly objects before Patty can respond. "No way. Neither of us are going to sleep with him just to make your life a little easier, Als."

"I didn't say you had to sleep with him!" Allie argues. "Just get him out of here."

Patty and Tash look at each other and laugh. "You really think either of us going up to him and saying 'hey, let's get out of here right now' isn't going to make him think sex is an option?" Patty asks between giggles. "Don't be naïve, Als. It doesn't suit you."

"Well, yeah, he's going to think it but that doesn't mean you actually have to fuck him." Allie shrugs. "Men think lots of crazy shit, we're not obliged to go along with their fuckitude."

Patty and Tash exchange looks again, and Tasha knows exactly what the other woman's thinking but won't ever admit. She says it instead. "Okay, total truth time. Als, you're not blind and you know how charming he can be. It's pretty clear he's got game and he knows it. I don't know about Patty, maybe she's stronger than me, but I have a feeling that if he really put his mind to it, he'd have me naked and begging in less than five minutes. I leave here with him, I'm definitely going to end up screwing him. And that's not good for anyone."

"You whore." Allie accuses, trying to hide her smile. 

"Damn straight, takes one to know one." Tash snarks right back, and is thrilled when Allie just laughs. She'd taken a gamble on that one, unsure if that would be enough to push Allie back into her panicked state about the situation or if it would make her laugh. 

Allie tries again, looking at Patty with pleading eyes. "Patty, please." 

Patty shakes her head, and blushes. "Like Tash said, only it wouldn’t even take a minute," she admits.

"Oh, so that's how it is." Tasha teases her. "I knew you had a crush on Weller, I just knew it. I don't know Patty, maybe you should take his cousin for a ride, get it out of your system."

"Just what ever you do, use condoms if you're not on the pill!" Allie grabs Patty's hand, begging her. "Condoms. So many condoms. Buy a box that has at least six in it, you're going to need them."

"I do not have a crush on Kurt!" Patty protests indignantly. "And really?" Her voice changes, and Tasha has to admit that she sounds dangerously intrigued by Allie's last comment. They're going to need a careful eye on her.

"Notice how she didn't say that she'd never had a crush on Kurt, just not one currently." Tasha looks at Allie, nodding her head knowingly. 

"Oh, and what about you?" Patty turns on Tasha. "Ms. 'Naked and Begging in Five Minutes or Less'. Yeah, that says you're completely indifferent to Kurt."

"She doesn't know?! Seriously!?!?!?!" Allie screeches. "Oh, this night just gets better and better, by the end, no one's going to have any secrets left at all."

"Shut it, Allie." Tasha hisses at her. 

"No, this is fabulous. This is really fabulous. Maybe we should go ahead and get Jane in here and we'll just go ahead and blab everything to everyone." Allie starts laughing hysterically, doubling over as she tries to get the laughter under control. 

"Ignore her, she's drunk and the panic's finally giving way to the alcohol again." Tasha instructs Patty as she glares at Allie some more. 

Patty looks at Allie, still doubled over, and back to Tasha. "I don't think I'm going to be able to do that. Spill. What about you and Kurt?"

"Oh look, Bee's awake. Someone needs to be fed. Allie, why don't you take care of that." Tasha tries distracting them as she lifts the baby out of the crib and tries to hand her off to Allie. As soon as her hands are free, she moves over to the area Kurt had set up for fixing bottles, grabbing a pre-mixed bottle of formula out of the mini-fridge and popping it into the bottle warmer. 

"You do know that involves my boob and not my mouth, right?" Allie asks as she settles back into the rocker. "I can feed and talk at the same time. I'm just talented that way."

"Not if you know what's good for you." Tasha smiles sweetly at her friend, revealing all her teeth, the tone of her voice letting Allie know it's a threat. "Also, you're drunk. You're not breastfeeding tonight. Put your bra back on, none of us want to see that and you're just confusing Bee."

Allie ignores her. "I'll tell you everything I know if you go get Scott out of here," she offers Patty. "I have the goods, you know I do."

Patty looks at Tash, tilting her head to the side, before grabbing the heated bottle and handing it over to Allie. "I don't know. I can make a pretty good educated guess without having to go anywhere near him and a bunch of bad decisions, I don't think it's a fair trade. Make it worth my while. Also, I'm with Tasha here, for the love of all that's holy, put your bra and shirt back on already!"

"What do you want?" Allie asks, ignoring Tasha as she starts flailing about, trying to distract both of them. 

Someone knocks on the door, then quietly opens it before Patty can strike a bargain. Jane sticks her head in. "Everything okay in here?"

"No, not it's not!" Tasha is quick to respond, before either of the two rat-finks she calls friends can blab to Jane. "Get your ass in here, we've got a baby problem."

Startled, Jane looks around quickly, eyes darting over to Allie and Bethany. "Fever? Sick? What do you need me to do? Do we need to go the hospital? Why don't you have a shirt on?"

"She's not sick, nothing like that." Allie calms Jane's fears, then takes a deep breath. "Just a slight paternity issue. Existential fears about if Kurt's really her daddy or not, you know how philosophical babies can get. It's the first stage of the Electra complex, I'm sure of it."

Jane blinks. "What." 

"What?" Allie echoes back, like she'd not said anything. "Did you need something, Jane?"

"For someone to tell me what's going on, I'm very confused." Jane blinks again. 

"Maybe you're not confused, you're just drunk? Please?" Allie asks, and Tasha can tell she's thinking of that ridiculous plan of hers from earlier. 

"No, definitely not." Jane shakes her head, then folds her arms over her chest. "Seriously, someone needs to start talking and now. We don't have a lot of time. I talked Sarah into taking her cousin, whatever his name actually is, out to get us some food. I sent them to that taqueria near the office with a super long list and also a request for ice cream and cake, so I'm thinking we have maybe an hour before they get back? Maybe less. So start talking. I know something's up. First, what is his name?"

"Scott's out of the apartment?" Allie tries to take the bottle away from Bethany, but the baby starts screaming. "Fuck. Okay, fine. I'll feed, Tasha – you call Kurt. Patty, fill Jane in."

"Oh, no." Tasha quickly refuses. "I'm not going to be the one that calls him. Patty and I aren't getting actively involved in this little family drama at all. No way. We're just witnesses-slash-observers-slash-moral support. Make Jane do it. She's already involved because of Kurt."

"Oh for fuck's sake." Allie complains. "Seriously, Tasha? You know this is one of your best friend duties. Man up and call Kurt."

"Not happening. Telling your supposed baby daddy that he needs to take a DNA test is not my job!" Tasha regrets the words the second they leave their mouth. 

"Okay, so the crazy ideas running through my head weren't so crazy after all." Jane says after a minute where they all just stand around staring at each other mutely. "I thought… doesn't matter what I thought. I don't want or need to know what happened, just tell me – what's the plan?"

"Seriously, that's your reaction?" Tasha was expecting more fireworks, to be honest. 

Jane shrugs. "With his clothes on, he looks just like Kurt about a day before an over-due haircut. If he'd shown up here some other day without Kurt or Sarah to introduce us, I would have assumed he was Kurt in some sort of playful mood. Based on what he said, I'm guessing you didn't know and ran into him somewhere without Kurt being present. I get it, I totally could have made the same mistake. Well, until I got him stripped. I would have been able to tell then. They're not as identical as they used to be."

They all look at her, expecting some sort of detail to go along with that. 

Jane smiles, but it's not a friendly smile. Tasha would go so far as to call it an evil smirk. "Let's just say if I have to have a giant 'Kurt Weller FBI' tattoo on my body, a little tat for tat is fair."

"The phrase is 'tit for tat'." Patty gently corrects her.

"No, I think tat for tat fits here." Jane smirks again. "Of course, I'm assuming there's no reason for Scott to have 'Property of Jane Weller' tattooed on his tight little ass. Left cheek, my handwriting. With little red hearts around it, too. I might be wrong, but I doubt it. And if any of you find out otherwise, don't tell me." She glances over at Patty, and Tasha wonders again just what had happened in the living room that she and Allie had missed. 

"That must be new." Tasha adds, after contemplating it for a few seconds as Jane has painted quite a vivid mental image for them. "I got an eyeful in the locker room after that last explosion. What was that, a month ago? Wasn't there then."

"Why do you think he has it now?" Jane states. "You're not the only one that got an eyeful that day. But that's enough about my fiancé's ass. Seriously, what's the plan here? Clock's ticking and we need to figure out something." 

Allie thinks about it for a few seconds, then offers "My hands are full, but if you dial and hold the phone for me, I'll ask Kurt to come over right now. I won't make you do the dirty work." 

"Or we could just use this time to plan and then deal with it tomorrow and not wreck my bachelorette party?" Jane asks, even as she pulls out her phone.

"Or we could try to wait until tomorrow and have that blow up in our face when Sarah accidentally says the wrong thing to Scott tonight or when they get back with the food and he realizes there's a baby in this apartment with half of his DNA." Allie argues back. "Besides, this party sucked to start with, and then it all went to hell in a hand basket the second Scott showed up and you know it. Calling Kurt's not going to be what wrecks it."

Patty leans closer to Tasha and whispers to her as the other women start bickering. "What happened to trying to not ever have to tell Kurt?" 

Tasha whispers her response even lower as Jane starts dialing. "She got over the panic and we've got our normal Allie back."

"I don't think that's a good thing." Patty worries as Allie starts chirping to Kurt about how they're all having a great time and how she thinks he and Conor should come and join them, but it's such a good time that he very much needs to leave Sawyer behind with Reade. And that he needs to do it pretty fucking quickly.

"It rarely is." Tasha responds truthfully. "But it's not going to be boring, that's for damn certain."


	4. The Ten-Ton, Pink Sequined Elephant Dancing the Lambada Naked in the Middle of the Room

Kurt and Conor make it to the Weller apartment in record time from Reade's; Tasha knows it ought to be about a twenty-minute walk from prior experience, but they come crashing through the door in about a third of that. 

"Where's Bee?" Kurt pants as he tries to get his breath back. 

Conor counters with a panted question of his own, seemingly in worse shape than Kurt. "Als? Where?"

"They're both fine." Tasha's quick to reassure them. "Allie's doing a quick diaper change. Jane's helping." She's fairly certain that, in reality, they're plotting how best to get back on Kurt's good side after this disaster instead of double-teaming a diaper, but that's something she doesn't want to know anything about. "Did you two run here?"

"Of course." Conor continues panting as Kurt makes his way to the kitchen. "Allie sounded super upset, and we'd had a few beers and I didn't think it was such a good idea to use the car."

"He wouldn't let me use the lights and sirens." Kurt loudly explains, fussing about in the kitchen. He makes his way back into the entry way and hands Conor a glass full of water, keeping another for himself. "I had one beer, I wasn't too drunk to drive, he was too embarrassed to be seen with me driving."

"It's not that." Conor protests weakly. "I'm a cop, I'm not embarrassed by lights and sirens. It was the blatant abuse of power that I protested."

Kurt just ignores him, turning to face Tash straight-on, cornering her with one of his patented 'FBI Special Agent Weller, ma'am, now talk' looks that she hates so much. "What's going on?"

"Uh…" Tasha bites her lip, not really sure what to say. She'd meant what she'd told Allie, she's not getting actively involved in this mess. 

"Patterson?" Kurt barks at Patty, who'd been doing her best to blend in with the wall. 

She won't meet his eyes. "It's an Allie thing?" she finally offers. 

Conor and Kurt look at each other. "Could be nothing." Conor offers. 

"Could be something." Kurt counters, finishing his drink in one gulp.

They both sigh. 

"It's Jane's bachelorette party. I can see the liquor bottles from here. For crying out loud, look at how red Patty is and how she's having to hold on to the wall to stay upright. You know they're more than just a little drunk. I'll bet you ten dollars Als and Jane have done something ridiculous to Bee and wanted us to see and they're trying to get some specific reaction out of us. Like total panic because it looks like they've pierced her nose or something." Conor sounds pained when he adds "Again."

Neither Tasha nor Patty correct his assumptions about their alcohol levels.

"I still can't believe you fell for that." Kurt laughs, and it twists Tasha's stomach, since she knows what's coming. 

"Like you're any better." Conor scoffs. "You can't lie to me, I saw your face when Allie convinced you that she'd gotten Bethany a tattoo because the baby wanted to look more like Mama Jane."

"It was a tramp stamp." Kurt growls. "On my three-month-old baby daughter. You reacted too."

Patty whimpers, and Tasha closes her eyes. Why, Patty, why?

"Patterson?" Kurt immediately jumps on the sound. "Talk to me, Patty. What do you know?"

"Thought of needles, I'm scared of them, tattoos are scary to me, I need to use the bathroom, come with me Tasha." Patterson babbles as she grabs Tasha's arm and drags her away from their conversation. They make their way down the hall.

Kurt yells after them. "You've already walked past the guest bathroom."

Tasha doesn't know what possesses her to yell back at him as they slip into the nursery. "Like you didn't already know Patty was making a bad excuse to get away from you." She quickly closes the door behind her.

Allie's pacing around the room frantically, mouth moving but no words coming out. 

Tasha looks at Jane, who's holding Bethany, then flicks her eyes over at Allie. Jane understands the unspoken question. "Practicing what she's going to say." She bounces the baby a bit, then pats her back several times. "Shhhh, shhhh, it's okay, Baby Bee, it's okay," Jane tries to soothe her. 

"Yeah, well, practice time's over, Conor and Kurt are here." Tasha informs them. "And don't you dare try to sweet talk me into telling him, Als."

"Could I bribe you instead?" Allie continues to pace. 

"Nope." Tasha motions for the baby, taking her away from Jane. Jane settles a burp cloth over her shoulder. "I'm staying in here with Bee and Patty, and we're going to hide away while you get to go have that little talk with Kurt."

"How about blackmail? I've got a lot of dirt on you, you'd hate for me to get… talkative…" Allie suggests, looking over at Jane and Patty. "I'm sure that there's a whole laundry list of things you'd like not to be public knowledge. I can think of at least two things right now."

"Two?" Patty asks, startled. "I mean, I can guess at thing number one, but two? What else have you done?"

"Who." Allie corrects. "You mean, who else has she done."

"Allie!" Jane scolds. "You can't threaten to tell us about her dating my brother, that's not very fair to Tasha."

"Roman!" Patty shrieks. "What the hell?"

"Dating. Yes. That's the word for it." Allie deadpans. 

"Nothing!" Tasha shrieks back. "Absolutely nothing!" It takes a minute for Jane's words to filter through her brain. "Wait, you knew about that already?"

Jane shrugs. " You weren't exactly quiet about it or discrete. I lived in that house when you were sneaking around, I know. I can recognize your voice, surely you know that by now. Tasha, I saw you slipping out of the second-floor window of my house at 5 am. Out of my brother's second-floor window, to be precise. Four days in a row. I'm fairly certain you weren't there to rob us. Repeatedly."

"She could have been." Allie defends her, which strikes Tasha as somewhat hilarious since she's the one who ran her big fat fucking mouth in the first place and started all of this. "You don't know her life."

"We didn't have anything worth stealing. We had a guy break in one time who came back and brought us an apology toaster and a bunch of food the next day since he thought we could use it." Jane says it completely nonchalantly, like it's a normal occurrence. 

"Jane!" Tasha, Patty, and Allie all scream at once. Tasha hasn't heard this story before, and she can't imagine why not. This seems like something Jane should have told them immediately after it happened, or at the very least mentioned during a girls' night out or something instead of springing it on them the middle of a 'who's the daddy?' crisis.

"What?" She looks confused as to their reaction. "Oh, like that hasn't happened to any of you." She seems completely forthright about it, and there's not a hint of sarcasm in her voice. Tasha has to believe that she's being sincere.

"No!" Patty sputters. "No, it hasn't! Why didn’t you tell us? That's a major security breach!" 

"Hey, what's with all the yelling?" Conor sticks his head in the nursery, looking at all of them. "Is everything okay?"

"We're fine, sweetie, we were just playing another round of 'that's really fucked up, Jane', you know how much we love that game." Allie quips. 

"It is one of your favorites." He agrees. "Hi, Jane. Happy Bachelorette Party. Is that the right saying," he asks Allie, "or am I supposed to say something else? What's the right saying for this type of situation? Happy last week of freedom? Congrats on your forthcoming leg shackling?"

"It's good enough." Tasha interrupts. "Allie, stop stalling. Get your ass out in that living room right this minute."

"But I don't wannnnnnnnna." Allie starts whining. 

Conor raises one eyebrow and looks at her. "Oh, this is going to be good. Is this a 'make popcorn' sort of thing, or a 'go ahead and pour Kurt a huge-ass cup of something alcoholic' thing?"

Tasha slaps her hand over Allie's mouth before she can ask what sort of booze pairs best with a paternity question; she knows her best friend well enough to know exactly Allie's about to say. "It's a 'why don't you hang out with us and let them talk privately' thing."

"Oh, well, you're hosed in that case." Conor says. "There's some weird dude in the living room chatting with Kurt. Do you want me to have him come hang out here with us? It's getting kinda crowded though. Maybe we should take over the living room, and Allie and Kurt talk in here instead."

"Fuck." All of the women say at once. They'd not been quick enough.

"That stupid worthless bastard's determined to wreck my life, isn't he?" Allie laments. 

"Well, that's a nice thing to say about the father of your baby." 

Allie blanches completely white just as soon as Conor makes his snarky comment, and Tasha could just smack him for so inelegantly putting his foot in his mouth, even if he doesn't yet know that he's done exactly that. She knows he's referring to Kurt while Allie's referencing Scott, but it's just a little too applicable to the situation. 

"Oh, fuck it all." Allie throws up her hands. "I am officially done with all of this shit. Done, do you hear me?" She marches out of the room.

They all stare after her. 

She marches right back in when no one follows her. "That was a 'I'm done with secrets, everyone follow me' comment, since you all seemed to miss your cues."

"I don't want to." Patty quickly shakes her head. "I'm staying right here with Tasha and Bee and I don't know anything about anything." 

"Get your ass out here right now!" Allie's words sound angry, but Tasha can see that she's shaking somewhat, and she knows that Als is trying to push down her fear. 

Tasha looks over at Patty, and nods slightly. "I'm ready for this night to be over, let's just do this if this it what it takes for us to be done and be allowed to go home."

"Do what?" Conor questions. "I'm lost. What's going on?"

None of them answer him, but Allie does take hold of his hand and threads her fingers through his as they walk down the hall. All of them except for Conor come to a dead stand-still when they see who Kurt's talking to. 

"Well, who the fuck are you?" Allie demands. "What the fuck? Why is every stranger in the city stopping by tonight? Jane, did you send RSVP cards for this lame-ass party out to the entire fucking world?"

Jane sounds semi-outraged when she responds. "There's nothing wrong with having basic manners."

"Whatever. Kurt, I need to talk to you." Allie bulldozes on, and Tasha can tell it's because she's trying to get it out before she completely loses her nerve.

Before Kurt can respond, the stranger addresses Allie. "Ma'am." Tasha can practically see his many years of military service based on how he holds himself, like his body's at war between relaxing and snapping to parade rest. If she's not wrong, he's having to fight the impulse to salute. She gets it; she's seen lots of soldier types respond that way to Allie, there's something about her attitude and mouth that apparently reminds them of their first drill sergeants. 

"Relax, Mikey." Kurt slaps his hand on the man's shoulder, leaving it there as a friendly gesture. "Allie, we can talk later. Let me introduce everyone first. Guys, this is Mikey Stonebridge. Mikey, these are my friends and family. Let me introduce you to my blushing bride first. Jane and I are getting married next weekend," he gestures and Jane steps forward to welcome the man. 

"I know." Mikey smiles at Jane. "Congrats. That's actually why I'm in town. We came in early for the wedding." He looks back over his shoulder at Kurt. "Be glad I confiscated Scott's invite. You know better than to give him a plus-one."

Kurt laughs. "Old dogs, new tricks, is that what you're telling me?"

Mikey grimaces, glancing quickly over at the rest of them before settling his gaze on Kurt. "New trick might be a very apt description, yes. You know how your cousin can be." 

Tasha supposes that if none of them had met Scott, that comment would have sounded a lot more innocuous than it sounds at the moment. Patty giggles nervously, and Tasha can tell she's had the same thought. 

Jane shoots Patty a quick disapproving glance as she welcomes the man to her home. "I'm so pleased to meet you, Mikey."

"Please call me Stonebridge. Or Michael, if you must. Please." He smiles at her warmly. "I'm afraid my partner is the one that got Kurt and Sarah into the habit of calling me Mikey. I'd really prefer not to be called that."

"Partner?" Tasha can't stop the word from escaping her mouth, and mentally chastises herself, warning herself again not to get involved. She's just shocked at the idea of Scott having a long-term partner, not after the way he'd hit on all of them, and there's no way it's just a coincidence that Sarah and Scott had discussed 'Mikey' being at family dinners and he'd just talked about Scott and 'your cousin'. She supposes that Scott could be bi or pan, that's easy enough to accept, but the idea of him having and keeping an actual long-term partner just seems ludicrous.

"What the fuck?" Allie practically screams. "Are you fucking seriously telling me that oversexed manwhore has a hubby?"

Kurt and Stonebridge look at them, and start laughing. Tasha knows that Allie, Patty, and Jane must all be wearing the same dumbfounded look that she is. 

"I take it that you all have already met Scott, then?" Stonebridge finally gets his laughter under control. Kurt's got tears running down his face, and he's shaking with mirth. 

"You could safely assume that." Allie comments dryly. 

"One, two, three, four…" Stonebridge comments cryptically as he looks over at them again. "Okay, that explains a lot. Scott texted me about an hour ago. 'Shiiiit,' and that's shite spelled with four I's, 'buddy, I've just hit the fucking mother lode of hotttties, again with four T's, don't wait up'. I take it he's already been here?"

Kurt's laughter turns into giant belly laughs as he falls back on the couch. 

"Stop laughing, this isn't funny!" Allie snaps at him. She turns on Stonebridge. "And you really need to put a leash on your man, he's out of control."

Kurt practically howls at that. Tasha can't imagine what's so fucking damn funny. 

Stonebridge shakes his head, still laughing. "Not life partners. No. No, no, no, no. No, ma'am. We were the lead partners of a British Military Intelligence strike team before we retired across the pond here. Honestly, he's my best mate and like my brother, definitely not a romantic partner by any stretch of the imagination."

"Oh, well that makes me feel only slightly less stupid." Allie honestly tells him, and Tasha knows the men in the room can't understand what she means, but the women all do. She then offers out her own hand in greeting. "Allie Knight, and this is my… uh…," she looks at Conor out of the corner of her eye, clearly at a loss for words as to what to call him. She finally settles on "This is my Conor. I'd normally say partner, but I'd be using a different definition than you just did and I don't want to confuse you."

"Allie." Stonebridge shakes her hand, then does the same to Conor. "Mate."

Kurt finally gets his laughter under control and walks over to Tasha, taking the baby from her. "Mikey, this is Tash and that one's Patty." He gestures his head in her direction. "They work with Jane and me at the FBI, and are two of our best friends." 

He waits for them all to shake hands and make polite introduction. With a giant smile on his face, he bounces the baby a bit then beams at Stonebridge. "And this is my daughter, Bee. Also known as the most perfect baby girl in the world. Yes you are, yes you are!" He coos at her. 

"She's beautiful." Stonebridge looks at the baby, then at Tasha, like he's looking for her features in Bethany's little face. 

Tasha quickly takes a step back, shaking her head slightly. "My goddaughter is beautiful, glad you can see that. I'm a very proud adopted auntie."

"Before you make an ass out of yourself telling Jane how great she looks and how quickly she got her fighting figure back, let me stop you. Not her's. Not Patty's either. Mine." Allie intercedes, clearly reading Stonebridge's confusion. "It's a long story, don't ask."

"Wasn't going to." Stonebridge holds out his hands for Bethany. "May I?"

Kurt gently hands the baby off to Stonebridge, who holds her with the stance of someone who's not entirely familiar with babies but would still do anything to protect her. She looks so small in his arms, and Tash knows that's more due to his musculature rather than Bethany's actual size. Tasha feels a twinge of something that – if they were in private – she'd bluntly describe to Allie as 'a severe case of exploding ovaries'. He looks too good with a baby, especially the way he's staring tenderly at her face. 

"She definitely got a large dose of Weller family genes." He laughs. "If she wasn't wearing pink, I'd swear I was looking at one of Finny's baby pics."

"Who's Finny?" Jane asks. "I'm sorry, I'm afraid I don't know the family as well as I'd like. I should, especially since I'm marrying into it."

Stonebridge continues to stare at Bethany, rocking her slightly, paying only minimal attention to Jane and the rest of them. "Finn is Scott's son. He's 19, so they don't have that much in common now, but she looks just like him at that age! Like they could be twins! Kurt, I've not seen any baby pics of you or any of the rest of the family, but I bet she looks just like Sarah did!"

He continues on while they all digest the info that Scott has a kid that old; he must have fathered him when he was that age or even younger. "We have a place in Vegas, Finny lives with us and is doing his first year at UNLV. Esther's just turned 17, and Scott's already losing his mind at the idea of her being almost old enough to go off to college too. They stayed at home though, I didn't think it was a good idea to bring them cross country for the wedding. School and all."

"Oh, you've got to be fucking kidding me!" Allie starts cursing, and Tasha wants very much to kick her before she can do any serious damage. 

Patty tries shushing her, to no effect. 

Allie continues ranting despite Jane grabbing her arm. "What am I, the universe's fucking butt-monkey? How many fucking kids does he have?!?! Has the man never heard of a condom or learned from his past fuck-ups at any point in the last twenty years? For fuck's sake!" 

Tasha just closes her eyes, knowing there's no way they're going to be able to make good excuses for what Allie had just ranted. At least, she can't think of any excuses, good or bad. Maybe Patty can use that big brain of hers to come up with something acceptable, but she doubts it. 

Stonebridge looks up at her, clearly rattled by her explosion. "Esther's adopted?" He offers weakly.

Tasha can tell that the question in his voice isn't over Esther's adoption status but rather if that statement's going to make Allie go off again. 

Allie just looks at him, then starts laughing. Patty and Jane are the next to start. Kurt and Tasha both snort and start laughing at the same time, and then Conor's laughing too. Stonebridge is the last to join them, but it's not long until all of them are crying laughing. Tasha doesn't even know why. None of this is funny, but at least she and the other women have the alcohol excuse. That, and the unbearable tension and stress excuse, but they can't exactly admit to that at the moment. 

They've barely got the laughter under control when Scott runs back into the apartment, slamming the door into the wall in his haste. Sarah's standing behind him, wielding her purse like she would a weapon. For some reason, that sets everyone back off giggling again. 

"Mikey!" Sarah calls out, pushes past Scott, and starts to throw herself at Stonebridge. "Oh, it's so good to see you again!"

Scott must see the baby in his partner's arms before Sarah does, and he grabs her instead. "Whoa there, Sassy, let's not squish the baby."

"Yes, let's not." Allie's voice is harsh, but her movements gentle as she takes Bethany back so that Stonebridge can properly greet Sarah. 

"Sorry, Sassy got a text that said we were needed back here ASAP, something was going on." Scott explains as he shuts the door and inspects the wall for damage. "We were both a bit concerned. Sassy said you'd had some criminal types do home invasions in the past."

"Who the fuck texted her? Which one of you bitches?" Allie demands, glaring at Tash, Patty, and Jane. They all shake their heads. 

"Edgar." Sarah answers, voice muffled against Stonebridge's neck. She waits until they're done hugging before continuing her explanation. "He wanted to let me know that Allie asked Conor and Kurt to come over quickly, that something was happening and that they were needed, and that she'd explicitly said that Sawyer needed to stay behind with him. I was so worried, especially with Bethany here!"

Allie, Patty, and Jane all glower at Tash, as if she's somehow responsible for Reade's actions. She holds up her hands, frustrated. "I didn't tell him to do it, you know what he's like! He thrives on stirring up shit!" 

That gets a series of nods. 

Scott saunters over and rests him arm across Allie's shoulders; Tasha has to wonder if the man has no sense of danger and self-preservation. He looks down at the baby, then starts cooing at her. "Who's a cutie? Who's a cutie? You are, darling!" Bethany kicks out at him. He sticks a finger closer to her for her to grab. "Well, fuck me, but isn't this just the most adorable baby!"

It's like watching a train wreck in slow motion; Tasha knows what's going to happen microseconds before it all starts unfolding in front on her. Bethany reacts the same way every time she hears her favorite phrase, laughing and giggling and cooing and acting like the universe's most adorable kid. Allie predictably closes her eyes and mutters "fuck me" under her breath, which of course just eggs Bethany on even more. Kurt, of course, starts grumbling and complaining just like he does every time he's reminded of Bethany's fascination with the phrase. She doesn't know Scott well enough to know for sure what he's going to do, but he reacts more or less like she's expecting – he gets the largest, most shit-eating grin she's ever seen and laughs, beyond amused by Bethany's antics. 

The worst of all is Stonebridge, who looks at Scott, then the baby, then Allie, then Kurt, then Scott, then the baby again. His jaw drops, and Tasha can tell he's figured out their not-so-well-kept little secret. She leans forward and places her hand on his arm, which is just as rock-hard as she'd imagined, and taps her fingers lightly against his skin. He's ex-military; she knows he should know Morse code for 'no, don't'. Just in case he doesn't, or he's too stunned to realize what she's trying to tell him, she catches his eye when he looks up at her and subtly shakes her head too. 

Tasha glances over at Kurt and can see that he's still not figured it out; the recognition just isn't there yet. She knows she'll be able to spot it when he does, he's not able to keep his emotions out of his eyes. There's a reason they all still tease him about his 'heart-eyes' for Jane. She's not looking forward to when he does know, because she knows it's not going to be happiness written in his features. 

Instead, Kurt looks somewhat pained about his daughter's love of 'fuck' but also incredibly proud and content. An arm slung around Jane's waist, he grins at his cousin. "She ought to be cute and adorable, she's mine."

Patty makes that whining, wounded bird noise in the back of her throat again. Tasha wishes she could just reach out and pinch her, but she's still got a tight grip on Stonebridge. Instead, she just glares at Patty, who does a bad job at faking a cough trying to cover the gaffe.

Nobody really notices Patty because of Scott's booming laughter. "You keep telling yourself that, buddy, we both know I'm the better-looking cousin." 

"In your dreams." Kurt teases him back. 

"Not just mine." Scott grins, looking around the room. "Let's do a poll. I bet more women here dream of me than you."

Kurt looks vaguely disgusted. "You've never met anyone but Sarah before tonight, Dame-Dame. That's low, even for you."

"Not true! Just ask Allie. She's gone for a ride or five on the Scott love train before." Scott winks at Allie, who elbows him in the stomach, but clearly not hard enough to shut him up. "Tell him, honey. That was, what, a year and a half ago? No, not quite that long. Fifteen, sixteen months ago?"

"I think I'm going to vomit." Patty's voice is low, but it carries in the sudden silence in the room. Tash completely understands that reaction. 

"I told you it was a bad idea to mix those liquors, but did you listen to me? No!" Sarah's voice is soft and soothing. "Come on, why don't you come lie down for a bit, Patterson. I'll get you a cold cloth for your head and some ginger ale. You'll feel better in a little bit."

Tasha can't believe that Sarah could possibly be so obtuse so as to not understand what's going on in the room. She bites her tongue to keep from screaming at her. She's still holding on to Stonebridge, and he shifts just enough that he's standing slightly in front of her instead of beside her; clearly, he's figured it out and is expecting some sort of trouble. Tasha notices that Jane's stepped slightly away from Kurt as well, nudging closer to Allie and Bethany. 

Conor somehow manages to do the math before Kurt. "Sixteen months ago?!?!?!?!" He gasps. "Als!"

"Fuck. My. Life." Allie mutters, then turns to Kurt. "I can explain."

Kurt just looks bewildered.

Scott looks down at Bethany again. "How old's the kid?"

"Oh, fuck." Tasha has the worst sudden headache. 

"Seven months." Allie admits. 

"That's weird, huh, we must have been hooking up about the same time that Kurtie and Tash were knocking boots." Scott clearly is in the same oblivious boat as Sarah. Tasha kinda wishes that she hadn't misled him into thinking Bethany was her's earlier, because it's definitely going to backfire on her now. 

"Yeah, mate…" Stonebridge steps into the fray. "That's Allie's baby. Not Tasha's. Allie and Kurt's."

Tasha could just kiss him for not putting a question at the end of that sentence. 

"Huh." Scott takes the news calmly. He turns to look at Allie. "I thought your boobs looked bigger! That would explain why. I was going to ask if it was an extreme push-up bra and if you needed any help taking it off later, but yeah, a baby definitely makes more sense."

"Conor?" Allie asks sweetly. "Can you please hold Bee for me?" 

He's quick to take the baby from her; all of them that are used to Allie know that tone of voice is dangerous.

The very next words out of Scott's mouth are a pained "owww, fuuuuuuhg me, I ding you brohg my nobe!"

"Yeah, well, be glad I didn't shoot you in the dick, you asshat!" Allie shakes her hand, then tenses and relaxes her fingers a few times. 

Conor hands the baby off to Patty, then takes her hand and examines it. "You'll probably have some bruising, but I don't think you broke anything. Well, nothing of yours." He amends after looking over at Scott. 

"Next time," Jane growls with a glare at Scott, "try to tense your elbow a bit further back, you'll get a better jab out of it. Decent form, but we can improve it. I can show you how."

Tasha wonders if Scott's bright enough to figure out just how very much trouble he's in; she somehow doubts it. 

"Wha?" He pulls his hands back from his nose, staring at the blood on his fingers. "Whaadid I do?"

"You were rude. I warned you." Sarah informs him. "I told you not to hit on my friends. Why do you think I told you that? It's because they're all more than capable of putting you in your place and inflicting some serious damage while doing so. Come on, I don't think it's really broken, but let's get you cleaned up and check for sure. Mikey?" 

Stonebridge looks down at her, a question in his eyes, and Tasha takes her hand off his arm. He quickly helps Sarah escort Scott towards the guest bathroom. Whatever's going to happen, he doesn't need to stay in the living room and be part of it.

"So…" Allie starts to say, then trails off. "Yeah, I've got nothing."

"Son of a biiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiitch!" Scott screams from the bathroom. 

"Oh, shut it!" Sarah shouts back. "It's just a little hydrogen peroxide, you big baby!" 

Jane, Patty, Tash, and Allie all wince at that statement. 

"What just happened?" Kurt still sounds confused, but there's a tinge of anger to his words. "Could someone please tell me what's going on?" He crosses his arms over his chest. 

They all look at Allie. "What, why is everyone looking at me?" She exclaims. 

"Oh, for fuck's sake, Allie." Tasha snaps. "You know exactly why."

"If I wanted to inflict serious bodily damage on him, I promise you I would have done more than punch him in the face." Allie avows. "You heard what he said to me!"

"Allie!" Tasha barks. 

Allie flips her off, but she does reach out her uninjured hand towards Kurt and murmurs to him that they really do need to talk. Kurt leads her into the kitchen, and Tasha just shakes her head. Of all the places… he couldn't have picked a room with a door and solid walls at least? She has to admit that Allie's been right the ten thousand times or so that she's complained that he's totally fucking useless. 

"So…" Conor looks around the room, turning his back to the kitchen, pretending that they can't still see Kurt and Allie. "Having a nice party, Jane?"

"Seriously?!?" Jane demands. 

"I'm trying to make small talk, what do you suggest we talk about? Other than the ten-ton, pink sequined elephant dancing the lambada naked in the middle of the room." He retorts. 

"You did what?!" They all hear Kurt bellow. Tasha wouldn't be surprised if all the china and cutlery in the cabinets started quivering at that volume. Everyone's head jerks in that direction, then they all turn away and stare out the window at the city. 

"Lovely weather we've been having." Patty says weakly. "Look how far you can see tonight. Great view."

Allie's even louder than Kurt. "Well, excuse the fuck out of me for not being a goddamn psychic!" 

"We can still hear you!" Conor yells over his shoulder in their general direction. "Just thought you should know!"

They quite down somewhat, angrily murmuring at each other. Everyone can still hear them and see them, but it's quiet enough that Tash can't quite make out the words any more.

"I wonder if his ass is as tight as his arm." She doesn't know what to add to the conversation, and she's slightly distracted. It's inappropriate, but really, it's not the worst thing that's been said that night.

"Now, see, that's how you properly derail a conversation and distract everyone from the fight in the kitchen. Well done, Tash!" Conor compliments her. "I assume you mean that Mikey dude. I bet he does. You should go find out and report back to us. Try bouncing a quarter on it. Do you have a quarter? I'm sure I've got one in my wallet if you'd like to borrow it." He thinks about what he'd just said, and shudders. "Actually, just keep it. I'm not going to want it back after you play with it on that dude's naked ass. Or any dude's naked ass, doesn't have to be his, I don't have anything against him in particular. I think I probably should bleach all my money, now, just to be safe. Who knows what perverted things people have been doing with it?"

"Well, fuck you and your evil twin!" Allie's gotten even louder than before. 

Kurt seems like he's not about to let her beat him in their screaming contest. "It seems like you already did!" 

"Oh, no. No, sir! You don't get to yell at me about this! I'm yelling at you because you should have fucking told me! I'm not the one at fault here!" Allie yelps. "And I told you just as soon as I could! I only figured it out forty minutes ago, and I would have told you even sooner if you hadn't blown me off when I told you we needed to talk the first fucking time!"

"Als told me that they had communication issues. Clearly the problem wasn't with volume," Conor remarks to the three of them, before turning to scream at Allie and Kurt. "Indoor voices! Use your fucking indoor voices! None of us want to hear this shit!" He turns back to Jane. "I hope you have a different party planner picked out for the reception. This bachelorette party kinda blows. Do you have anything to eat? All this screaming has worked up my appetite. I could murder a piece of cake. Or pie. I'm not picky."

"There's not any food, sorry. Look at how sleepy Queen Bee is, I'm going to go put her down." Patty flees towards the nursery the first chance she gets. Tasha would be willing to bet everything that Patty's not going to come back out until all the arguing is over; she can't really blame her. She's half-tempted to follow her, but she knows that Allie expects her to hang around for some type of dubious moral support. 

"Well how was I to know you have a fucking look-alike running around loose on the world, Kurt? You never told me! It's not like I was trying to fuck all of your family members! If I was, I wouldn't have started with him!" 

"If she blurts out that I once asked for a threesome with Sarah, could one of you two please kill me before he gets the chance to? I swear to God, it was a joke, I didn't really mean it." Conor buries his head in his hands. "Jane, please. I'm sure you could snap my neck like a twig. Don't let him rip me apart limb by limb. Please. I'm begging you."

"You requested what?" Sarah's voice is sharp. 

"Fuuuuuuuck." Conor groans. "She's standing right behind me, isn't she?"

"Yeah, buddy, she sure is." Scott says. "Her and her two over-protective almost-brothers. You wanna repeat what you just said?"

"Oh, like you have any right to get all indignant." Tasha whirls around to yell at him. "You hit on all of us!" That when she notices the tampons hanging out of his nostrils, and starts laughing. She's surprised he hadn't decided to just hide in the bathroom until the bleeding had completely stopped; most of the guys that she knows would have. Sarah had found a band-aid with silly cartoon characters on it – for her own sanity, Tasha has to believe it's one meant to be used by Sawyer and not Kurt or Jane – and had plastered it across the bridge of his nose. 

"That's different." He tries to defend himself, but quickly realizes that he doesn't have a leg to stand on. "Fine, I'm a dog, I get it. Sorry." He doesn't sound very sorry.

"What do you want me to say, Kurt?" Allie starts screaming again. "It's not like I did it on purpose! I thought he was you! It's not like I said, 'self, let's go out and cheat on Kurt, and pick the absolute worst person on earth to do so with, the one that's going to end up hurting Kurt the most'!"

"Huh." Scott says. "So she was seeing Kurt back then?"

"Yes!" Jane yells at him. "You're just now figuring that out?"

"You'll have to excuse him, he's been hit in the head a lot." Stonebridge tries to excuse away Scott's obliviousness. "Apparently it's one concussion too many."

"Wait, what's going on?" Sarah asks. "Why are Kurt and Allie screaming at each other in the kitchen? They do realize that we can see and hear them, right?"

"I think it might be a family trait instead of a concussion." Tasha tells Stonebridge. "Fairly certain Sarah's not been hit in the head. Unless her older brother or cousin dropped her a bunch as a baby? Kurt's fairly oblivious at times too. I'd be willing to bet it's genetic."

"So I may have bedded Allie while she was with Kurtie." Scott informs Sarah. "You know, I probably should have realized she knew him. I mean, she did come right up to me and said 'Hey, honey, so glad to see you here tonight, I didn't think you be here! It's just great that you could make it! You should have brought your friends!' and kissed me and everything. And she laughed at me when I introduced myself and said 'Really?' like she didn't believe me. I just thought she was just really sexually aggressive."

"She is." Conor confirms. "In general. But it's a lot more obscene that that. And she usually doesn’t ask guys to include their friends."

"I. Didn't. Know! What else do you want me to say, Kurt?!" Allie shouts again. 

"Were they like together together?" Scott asks. "Like dating? Just how mad is Kurtie going to be at me?"

Jane hisses. "If I ever have to hear about the two of them and that horrible summer again, it'll be too soon. I'm going to go check on Bee and Patty." She stalks out of the room before anyone can stop her, grabbing something off the credenza as she goes. 

"It's a sore point." Tasha explains needlessly.


	5. Did You Learn Nothing from Bob Barker?

For some reason, that breaks some of the tension in the room. 

"Huh. So they were together and she got pregnant. I wonder if that was before or after our thing?" Scott finally says. "I mean, I already feel weird enough knowing I fucked my cuz's girl. It'd be super weird to think I fucked my little cousin's pregnant girl. I don't think I've a fucked a preggo in the last two decades. Not one of my usual kinks, really, you have to believe me."

"Oh my God, you stupid, stupid man!" Tasha has finally had enough. "Why do you think everyone's so tense and Allie and Kurt are fighting in the kitchen? News flash: it's because you're the ignorant condomless slut that knocked her up, not him! It was your demon semen!"

"What?!?!?!" Kurt and Scott both bellow at the same time. 

Conor brings his head up to the bridge of his nose. "Uh, Tasha, sweetheart… I don't think Kurt had quite gotten that far in his mental processing. Allie's not said a word about the baby yet, just in case you've not been following the fight closely enough."

"Oh, fuck me." Tasha's headache gets even worse. "Did I just say that out loud?" 

"Yep." Conor confirms. "Totally didn't use your inside-your-head voice. Just blurted it right on out, loud enough so that everyone could hear you. Nice, clear diction too."

Scott starts cackling. 

Allie stomps out of the kitchen, Kurt right on her heels. "It's not funny!"

"It's really not, mate." Stonebridge confirms. "I've told you at least a thousand times you need to be more careful!"

"Allie?" Kurt's voice is as full of pain as Tasha thought it was going to be; she wishes she were a million miles away, and that she'd not been the one to do this to him. 

"I don't know, okay?" Allie sounds utterly defeated. She wraps her arms around her middle, folding in on herself slightly. "I just don't know. With the timing, it could be either of you. Patty already said she'd be able to get the test run ASAP using the FBI labs."

Scott slumps over on the couch, still laughing hysterically. Sarah sits next to him, patting his arm. "It's okay," she tries to tell him. "Just breathe. You're in shock right now."

"I'm not in shock." He manages to get out. "That's not my kid. Totally Kurtie's, unless there's something else you're not telling him, Allie." At that, he starts laughing even harder, reaching the point where he's having to hold on to his sides. 

"No." Allie shakes her head. "No, she's definitely yours or Kurt's, you were the only two. But you were the only one I was careless with. Kurt and I always used condoms!"

Sarah grimaces. "I really don't think I want to hear any more of this. I'm going to go find Jane, Patty, and Bee." 

Scott grabs her hand. "No, stay. Seriously, that's not my baby, we don't even need to discuss this any more."

Stonebridge frowns at him some more. "You really need to take more responsibility for your actions, Damien. You're better than this. I really thought you'd grown up over the last few years." Disappointment drips from his voice.

"We had some fun, right Als? But that's it!" Scott shakes his head. "Kurt, she's yours. This conversation is over."

Conor grabs the back of Tasha's shirt and yanks her back into the kitchen area. Tasha completely understands why; Kurt's bright red and looks like he's about to start breathing fire or have his head explode or something. She doubts he'll charge his cousin since Sarah's sitting right there like a human shield, but she's not positive. 

Stonebridge sees their movements out of the corner of his eye, and turns to look at them. He gestures at Allie and Sarah, then nods. Tasha doesn't know how she knows this, but she thinks she understands him well enough to know that he'll protect the other two if and when Kurt loses it. She's fairly certain he'll let Kurt get in a good few punches before pulling the cousins apart, but he won't let them get too out of hand.

"Damien." Kurt's voice is low, an animalistic growl. "She's the best baby in the universe, and she absolutely deserves to know her father, whichever one of us that might be. We're taking this test and you are going to do the right thing. I love her," his voice cracks. "I'm always going to love her, but she needs to have you in her life."

Tasha doesn't know how she's ever going to be able to work with him again if this test doesn't come back in his favor; it's too much to bear. She really wishes she'd gone with Patty out of the room.

"Kurt." Scott stands up, letting go of Sarah. He reaches over and places both hands on Kurt's shoulders, looking in his eyes. "There is absolutely zero doubt in my mind that Bee is yours. Zero. You don't need to get so worked up over this. Don't. Just… don't. Don't do this to yourself. If you want to punch me for fucking your girl, that's fine, I probably have it coming. Just… not the nose. Please. But that kid is yours."

"For fuck's sake, do you not understand how condoms work?" Allie screeches at him. "Kurt used them. You didn't. Ergo…"

"Ergo, if you think condoms are so great, maybe you should have insisted on some." Scott retorts. "I said I didn't want to, and you said 'sure, fine, sounds good to me, just get in me already'. Don't yell at me for something you agreed to! You don't get to blame me for your mistakes, honey."

"I let you come inside of me five times that night!" Allie screams back at him. "Clearly that was a major mistake."

Sarah winces and covers her ears with her hands. 

"Yeah, one I'm paying for." Conor mutters. "She's never, ever going to let me touch her without at least four forms of birth control. It's like trying to have sex while wearing two suits of armor and a latex gimp suit. Plus, do you have any clue how exhausting it is trying to keep up with that standard? Dude, you're not twenty anymore, how the fuck did you manage that? Were you snorting Viagra or something?"

Tasha steps down on his foot, trying to shut him up. He's not going to add anything useful to the discussion, and he's just going to mentally scar her if he keeps talking. There are so many things she doesn't want or need to know about her best friend's sex life, and Conor's even worse than Als when it comes to discretion and TMI.

"Scott!" Allie faces off against him, hands on hips. 

"Condoms aren't perfect. I know you think they are, but they aren't." He tries reasoning with her. "Bethany is Kurt's. That's the bottom line."

"Let's just do the test and talk about this later." Kurt sounds exhausted. "We'll all feel a bit calmer in a few days."

"Shut up." Allie and Scott both round on Kurt, then start screaming at each other.

"She's yours!" Allie yells at Scott. "I know she's yours! Could you at least pretend to give a fuck?"

"I'll take the damned test if it makes you happy, but I'm telling you now, there's no need, she's not my daughter!" Scott shakes his head. "Why won't you believe me?"

"Because!" Allie shakes her finger in his face. "Condoms are the best form of birth control! Fuck, you didn't even attempt to pull out! Ergo…"

"Ergo, condoms have a two percent chance of not working even when you use them perfectly. Really, it's more like a twelve to fifty percent chance of failure, because who the fuck can use them perfectly? Condoms are not the best birth control out there." Scott retorts. "Ergo, do you not understand how a vasectomy works? Now let's see, a fifty percent chance of Kurtie's precious condoms failing versus a zero percent chance of me somehow spontaneously not shooting blanks for the first time in decades…" 

Whatever Allie's about to say dies on her lips. "What."

"Not that it's really anyone's business, but I got clipped right after Finn was born." Scott admits. "Hell, one unplanned kid's all I'm planning on handling in this lifetime. I don't go around announcing it to the world, but I'm 110% positive that Bethany's not mine. It's just not physically possible."

Allie and Kurt reach out for each other's hands at the same time, bracing each other against the shock; Tasha turns slightly away, this feels like something she's not supposed to be seeing. 

"Why didn't you say that sooner?" Allie asks.

"I told you she wasn't mine!" Scott replies. "I've been telling you that. You just wouldn't listen!"

Allie shrugs. "I thought you were just being a douche bag and a deadbeat dad. You could and should have ended all of this a hell of a lot sooner and not put us through this, asshole! All you would have had to do was say 'the vet spayed me' just as soon as Tasha yelled out about the baby and we wouldn't have had to go through all of this!" 

"Actually, males get neutered, not spayed." Conor interjects. "Did you learn nothing from Bob Barker? The 'Price is Right' is my jam, people."

Everyone except for Kurt yells at him that time. "Shut up, Conor!"

"She's really mine?" Kurt asks, voice low and rough.

"I'll take the damned DNA test if you want me to, if that's what it's going to take to make you feel secure about this," Scott offers. "But I can go ahead and tell you right now what the results are going to be. She's definitely yours. Fuck, Kurt, she looks just like you and Sarah told me that she acts just like you too, of course she's yours." 

Kurt walks away without a word to anyone, headed to the nursery. 

They all stand around the living room while he's gone, no one making eye contact. 

Patty wanders back into the living room, weaving about slightly. "They need a minute." She sounds uncomfortable. 

"I need a smoke." Scott says, pulling a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket. "I'll be on the balcony." He moves to walk that way, and no one stops him. 

Stonebridge quickly follows him, closing the door behind them. 

"Well, this has been a fucking disaster." Allie throws up her hands. "I don't even know what to do to start fixing it."

"Nothing." Conor advises, kissing her forehead. "There's nothing any one of us can say that will fix things right now. Unless it's 'I have a time machine, jump in' or 'time turners are real, silly Muggles'. Or 'we accidentally took peyote and this has been one hell of an unreal trip'. Although I'd have to think that if we were all hallucinating, we wouldn't have hallucinated this shit. I know if I were hallucinating, everyone would have been naked and it would have been a lot more fun. Fun and dirty. Really, if anyone's going to speak up, I want it to be because you have a DeLorean DMC-12 parked out front, that would be awesome. But no one's going to say that, right?" 

"God, I wish I could." Patty slumps down on the sofa, hiccuping, while Sarah collapsing next to her. "But at least Jane and I ordered pizza while we were hidi… giving everyone time to discuss. We totally weren't hiding in the nursery. But yay, pizza! And we still have plenty of booze. So much booooooooooze." She hiccups again. "I still want to play Parcheesi. Doesn't strip Parcheesi sound like so much fun?!"

"Strip." Allie slowly annunciates. "Parcheesi. Patty, sweetheart, those two words don't go together. And that's coming from me, of all people." She huffs. "Strip Parcheesi. Jesus, take the wheel."

"You ordered pizza?" Tasha doesn't understand. "The hell?"

"Jane brought a bottle with her. We did a shot every time we heard someone yell. It's not a very fun drinking game, but after awhile, I didn't even care. You people are really loud, did you know that? We hit the hungry stage of drunk." Patty explains, falling over to rest her head in Sarah's lap. "Well, technically the stage where Jane starts making grabby motions and demanding chicken enchiladas with extra sri.. shi… schri… that hot stuff I can't say right now, and I'd do just about anyone for a cheesecake but still. Or ice cream. Ooooh, ice cream, yessssssss… We sorta kinda figured you all would scream yourselves out before the food got here, or be hangry enough to want a pizza break. Or you'd all kill each other and we'd need some food before we could bury the bodies, Jane knows a guy. I can't feel my face, is that normal? But… yay! Pizza! Pepperoni fixes everything, you know."

Conor's eyes light up. "No, I don't know that. Tell me more." He drops down on the sofa next to Patty, combing his fingers through her hair. The noise she makes is practically a purr, or as close as a human can come to purring. 

"Don't take advantage of how drunk she is." Allie warns. 

"I would never!" Conor immediately responds, dismayed that she would ever think that about him.

"Not like that, doofus. Of course you wouldn't." Allie rolls her eyes, but her voice is warm. "I mean, don't mock her or talk down to her or get her saying stupid stuff to tease her about later."

"But Allie…" he whines. "She just invented a theory of pepperoni as a universal cure-all. She said, and I quote, she'd 'do just about anyone' instead of saying that she'd do just about anything. Tell me you don't want to pour another drink into her and see what that crazy, beautiful mind comes up with next."

"Behave." Tasha warns him too. "Actually, go outside and talk to the guys. Let them know pizza's on the way and that they should come in soon and that they have to behave too. Be sure Scott's fully aware that if he hits on Patty when she's in this state, they'll never find his body."

"But I want him too." Patty mumbles, trying to sit up and failing miserably; she flops back down across Sarah's lap. "He's so pretty."

"Ew." Sarah states. "Like I said earlier before the shit hit the fan, ew and could you please just not? I know entirely too much about my brother and Damien now, and I don't want to hear another word!" She rolls her eyes up to the ceiling. "Lord, this has been the worst, grossest, most trying night of my life since that day I accidentally gave Sawyer and Kurt food poisoning. Why are you testing me like this? Please make them start behaving and stop grossing me out. Strike them down with laryngitis if you have to. Please. Amen."

"Pretty." Patty states again. "I want ice cream, who do I have to blow around here to get some ice cream? Can it be the pretty one? Or the other pretty one?" 

"Jesus, please, I'm begging you." Sarah prays again. 

Conor puts his fist in his mouth to stifle a laugh. "Oh my God, she's adorable. Adorable and drunk off her ass. You're right, we need to protect this precious creature. I'll take care of it." He slips out onto the balcony too, and starts gesturing towards them. Tasha's not entirely sure what he's telling them, but it certainly involves a lot of hand gestures. It also involves Conor reaching up and pulling the tampons out of Scott's nose and the cigarette out of his mouth and throwing them all over the side of the railing. 

They're coming back inside just as someone starts pounding on the door. It swings open without any of them touching it, and that's when Tasha realizes Scott must have broke the lock when he and Sarah had come to their 'rescue' earlier. The pizza guy looks at it, then at all of them. "I swear it was like that when I got here."

Sarah tries to get up, but Patty grabs hold of her legs and won't let her move. "My bed's moving, why is my bed moving? I'm not having any fun. It ought not be moving. New rule – my bed only can move when I'm having fun in it with someone pretty. Unless it's an earthquake." 

Conor starts cackling. "I love that woman so much, she's my new favorite out of all of you."


	6. All's Well That Ends Well

"This is really good." Scott says, or at least, that's what Tasha thinks he says. It's hard to tell for sure with the amount of pizza he's got stuffed in there. "I always forget how good authentic New York style pizza is."

The only response is another loud snore from the couch. 

Conor looks over in that direction, then back at Allie. "Are you sure I can't wake her up enough to get some food into her?" He pleads.

"No." Allie and Tasha reply angrily at the same time. 

"We're not waking her up and letting her say or do something stupid." Tasha defends their decision to let sleeping Pattersons lie. "Have you already forgotten that ridiculous board game idea of hers?" 

"But she fell asleep before we even got the delivery dude paid." He argues. "You know she's going to be better off in the morning if there's some carbs and fats in her systems to help sop up the alcohol. And water! We should be making her drink water."

"He's right." Scott agrees, grabbing another piece of pizza out of the box in front of him. "Trust me, I'm a fucking hangover champion. Blondie needs some of this excellent meat."

Kurt growls at him. 

Jane's curled up in his lap, plastered against him. She puts a calming hand on his arm, and kisses his cheek. "It wasn't a 'meat trophy' joke, calm down." She giggles to herself. "Ha. Calm down about the meat trophy joke, meat trophy. My meat trophy." 

Allie and Tasha look at each other, but don't say anything. Clearly they need to institute some sort of 'can't drink in the baby's room' rule, to prevent anything like this from happening again. Jane and Patty took things a lot further than any of them had intended for this party. Tasha can't exactly blame them, but she knows that they're both going to be miserable tomorrow.

Kurt just sighs and nudges Jane, prompting her to take another large drink from her glass of water.

"Dude, I'm talking about this three-meat pizza." Scott rolls his eyes. "It's really fucking good."

"For once, I think he actually wasn't being crude." Stonebridge defends his friend. "Hard as it is to believe."

Scott glares at Kurt and Stonebridge. "Mikey, you're supposed to be on my side! I can go five minutes without hitting on someone, you know." 

"Since when?" Allie asks, indignant. "You've been hitting on all of us since you got here."

"Well, yeah, but that's because you're all hot." He argues, then pauses for a second. "And conscious. I have standards."

"Since when?" Stonebridge echoes, sotto voce, only loud enough that Scott, Tasha, and Conor can hear him. Conor starts choking on his slice of Patty's beloved pepperoni pizza. 

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, fuck you too, pal." Scott puts down his slice just long enough to flip him off with both hands. He waits a second or two before opening his stupid mouth again. "But seriously, Kurt, what the hell? How on earth did you manage to put together this beautiful little harem?"

Stonebridge looks at him like he's never seen him before, mouth hanging open in shock. "Are you actively suicidal?"

"No!" Scott motions around at the group. "I'm just not blind. Look around, Mikey! Look at the women he's surrounded himself with! Well, no, don't look at Sarah, I didn't mean that, you're not allowed to look at her like that."

"Gee, thanks." Sarah comments from the couch, still trapped under Patterson. 

"Love you, too, Sassy." Scott blows her a kiss. "But just look at them! You can't have all of them looking like this and then get mad when I flirt a little! It's like you reached directly into my brain and pulled out all the best fantasies and put them together as your own little set of Weller's Angels."

"Jesus Christ, he is suicidal." Allie comments. "Scott, I don't particularly like you right now, but let me tell you, you don't want to give Kurt any more reason to disembowel you."

"Eh, that's harder to do than it looks, he'll be hard pressed to get through the abdominal wall." Scott seems unphased by the idea. "And it's messy. Kurtie's never been a fan of messy. Worst he'll do is shoot me. Big whoop. Fuck, it's been a solid eight months since I've been shot, I'm due for one."

They all stare at him. 

"Kurt, can we recruit him for the team? We need a new trouble magnet that's not you." Jane suggests. "It'd be so much fun to have someone else get shot and blown up for a change!"

"Jane, baby, eat your pizza." Kurt instructs her. "You don't know what you're saying."

"I don't think Patterson would mind." Allie murmurs to Tasha, and they both start cackling. Kurt just glares at them. 

"Fuck yeah, I volunteer as tribute!" Scott says, a wicked gleam in his eyes. "Hot chicks and guns and danger! Can I request an undercover role that requires me to have Jane as my girlfriend? Or Tash? Or Patty? Or some combination thereof? Please?"

"No." Stonebridge says firmly. "We are not getting back into this lifestyle and we are not moving to New York and you are not going to hit on any of them any more. Have you learned nothing tonight?"

"I'd break you like a matchstick." Jane doesn't sound the least little bit impressed by him. "You can't handle me."

"Oh please, oh please, oh please, let's test that hypothesis out." Scott flirts back. 

They all stop and stare at him again, stunned more by that than anything else he's said. All except Stonebridge. He just sighs, and takes another slice of pizza out of the box. 

"What?" Scott questions. "Why is everyone looking at me like that?"

"Because… because you know words." Jane explains in an explanation that really doesn't do much for anyone who doesn't know Patterson very well.

'Because he knows words' Conor mouths at Allie, before putting his head down on the table and cackling. "Oh my God, I couldn't even make this shit up if I tried."

"You used 'hypothesis' correctly." Tasha's beyond stunned. 

Kurt is too. "You didn't say 'theory' like most everyone else would."

"Well, yeah." Scott nods. "I might play dumb, but I do know how words work and what they mean. And the scientific method. I'm not a total idiot."

Kurt, Jane, and Tasha exchange long glances. 

"Just…" Kurt struggles with himself, then settles on "Don't say that around Patty. Okay?"

Scott scrunches up his brow, and looks back over his shoulder at Patty and Sarah again. "Why?"

"Because she'll take it as some weird-ass form of foreplay and climb you like a tree." Conor lifts his head up to look at Scott before cackling again. "She's weird like that."

Allie wads up a napkin and throws it at him, pegging him right in the face.

Conor catches it before it can fall on the floor and tosses it right back at her. "What?" 

"Because we're not encouraging that!" She hisses.

"Eh." He doesn't seem to care. "I already gave him the shovel talk, he knows I'll throw him off of a balcony or roof if he hurts her, and that's only if he survives what the rest of you do to him first. He's clipped, what's the worst he can do?"

Stonebridge pushes his plate aside, and lightly bangs his head against the table. "Please don't encourage him. Please."

"So why did you get a vasectomy?" Jane asks. "I asked Kurt to get one, but he seems oddly squeamish about letting anyone else handle his dick and balls. I guess that's what happens when you date Nas for awhile. That, and I think he's got some weird ideas about knocking me up. That's called a fetish, right?"

"Jane!" Kurt and Sarah both try to shush her, while Conor, Allie, and Tasha start laughing. Patty may have been the drunker of the two of them, but Jane was definitely well past her normal limits.

"What?" Her eyes widen. 

"Because that's not polite to ask someone!" Kurt hushes her. "And don't say things like that!"

"Because I'm an unrepentant slut." Scott admits. "What? I know what everyone thinks. I like women, I like pussy, I'm good at getting it when I want it, which is pretty much all the time. No shame in the game, everyone has some fun. I also know that the odds aren't in my favor using condoms or relying on everyone I sleep with to be on the pill. Fuck, I don't want my own personal little army of mini-mes running around." 

"That thought is enough to give me nightmares for a month." Stonebridge jokes. "A whole battalions of little attitude problems like him, I'd completely lose my sanity."

"Same reason I let the Army test experimental STD prevention vaccines on me. I know the odds. Besides, with my job…" Scott pauses, and there's some weird look that passes between him and Stonebridge that Tasha doesn't know how to interpret. He corrects himself. "With my old job, it was just safer. I did what I had to in order to get the job done. Didn't always do it by the book, either. Fucked more than my fair share of terrorists."

"Not me!" Jane shrieks. 

They all look at her.

"Not me, right?" She's completely freaked out and looks horrified. "I can't remember, there was this thing, it's a long story, amnesia's not fun, but… not me, right? Please, God, not me. Kurt, I can't marry you if I slept with him, I can't do that to you."

"Oh, fuck me." Kurt closes his eyes. 

"I've never seen you before tonight." Scott's utterly confused. "Why would you even say something like that? Why would you even think it?"

"I would have had longer hair, no tattoos, been a lot bitchier, used a different name. Were you ever in Afghanistan?" Jane babbles on. "I don't know where all I was stationed, but I know I was in Afghanistan in 2013. Does the name Remi mean anything to you?"

"Jane." Tasha advises. "Shut. Up. Remember, classified."

Jane gasps. "Oh my God. Oh. My. God!" Does the name 'Shepherd' or 'Ellen Briggs'? Tell me you didn't sleep with my mother!"

"Jane!" Tasha and Kurt both yell this time. 

Conor's looking at the ongoing discussion like he's watching a tennis match. "This is better than anything on TV. We seriously should get a film crew in here. It'd be a reality show unlike anything anyone's ever seen. I'd pay to watch this and not just illegally stream it online. Who else has anything they'd like to confess?"

"Tasha slept with my brother." Jane adds. "Or am I only supposed to confess things that I did?"

"Jane, shut up!" Tasha looks over at Kurt. "Can't you do something with her?"

"Patty did too." Jane continues on like she can't even hear Tasha and Kurt. "She thinks I don't know, but I do."

"What?!?!?" Tasha, Kurt, and Allie all scream at the same time. 

"Un-huh. In a holding cell at the FBI. It had glass walls. Who does that?" Jane nods her head a few times, then kisses Kurt's cheek. "And this one seems to think I don't know that he fucked Tasha. Before she joined the FBI." She leans forward and stage-whispers at Scott and Stonebridge. "I think that might even be why she joined. I'm glad Keaton doesn't know, no one tell him how to successfully recruit her."

"You're right, this is better than TV." Scott is absolutely gleeful as he addresses Conor before turning back to his cousin. "Kurtie, I knew you were keeping secrets from me! What was that you were saying about how disrespectful I was being to your harem? I just flirted with them, you've fucked... what… all of them?"

"Nah." Jane continues talking, even though Kurt's trying his best to cover her mouth. "Not Patty. He's too scared of her. I love that he's scared of her and not me. It's fabulous, isn't it?"

"Yes, yes it is. Tell us more." Scott encourages her. 

"Of course, I saw some of the bruises and marks she left on Roman. No wonder Kurt's scared, he does have such sensitive skin. Oh, this is fun! Since I can't remember a lot of what I did, it's no fun to play 'I've Never' so Kurt and I like to have a few drinks and play 'Don't Judge Me But…' and use it to generate fun play time ideas. That's how I learned that I really like to handcuff him and he really likes this weird thing he calls 'tea bagging'. Do you know what that is?"

Tasha's fairly certain she's going to have to quit her job because she's never going to be able to look Kurt or Jane in the eye again.

"Oh, and we bought this big mfffffff…." Kurt covers Jane's hand with his mouth, but she apparently just licks or bites him, Tasha's not sure which. As soon as his hand's lifted, she keeps right on talking. "And I really, really like it when we get into role play. He loves the Marvel movies, did you know that? It's so much fun to pretend he's Thor and I'm Sif!" She leans forwards and loudly announces "His penis is his hammer." 

"Oh my God." Conor claps his hands together with delight. "This is the best thing ever."

"No, it's not." Kurt glares at him. He's clearly reached his limit of what he can tolerate. "Okay, we're done here. This is a thing that is over. Party over. Time for everyone to go home." He stands up, and starts trying to push them towards the door. 

"But Jane just started telling us all the good stuff." Conor whines. 

"Out you go, thank you all for dropping in, so nice of you." Kurt has Conor firmly in hand as he tries to shove him towards the entrance way. 

"We're not done eating!" Scott tries arguing. 

"Take the pizza with you. Take all the pizza with you. Time for you to go. Well past time for you to go." Kurt grabs up the pizza box with one hand and the back of his cousin's shirt with the other. "I love you, I'm not as mad as I was, we'll talk later in the week, good seeing you, goodbye."

"But Kurt!" Jane steps between them. "It's my bachelorette party!"

Kurt leans over and starts whispering in her ear, wrapping one arm around her waist as he does so. Jane's eyes dilate. "Oh, hells yes, it's time for you all to leave. Bye!" She shoves Scott in the direction of the door, and he barely misses stumbling over Conor. 

Stonebridge stands up, and offers a hand to Tasha. "We're going, no need to throw us out. I'd offer to help clean up, but I'm thinking you wouldn't accept?"

"Get out." Jane smiles at them. "It's hammer time. He's going to prove to me that Als and Tash and Nas mean nothing, and you can't be here to see it. I think I want to do it on this table, that seems like fun."

"Someone please get Patty off of me and let me out of this house of horrors!" Sarah shrieks. "Why? Why would you ever say such a thing out loud?"

Stonebridge walks over and picks up Patty as if she weighs no more than one of the pizzas; Tasha's impressed. "Are we putting her in a guest room or…?"

Tasha and Sarah exchange glances. "I'm going to Edgar's," Sarah says. "It seems wrong to leave her here."

"I'm not going to ask you to carry her ten blocks to my place." Tasha would love to, but that's definitely asking too much. "I think if you can get her downstairs, we can call an Uber and I can get her out on the other end."

"It's not a problem." Stonebridge assures her, adjusting Patty slightly so that she'd be in a more comfortable position. 

"Great!" Jane beams at them. "Get gone. Now. Als, you too!"

"Keep your pants on two minutes and let me go grab Bethany." Allie argues. "Your shirts too! All of the clothes stay on!"

"Are you sure we can't stay?" Scott teases as Allie darts towards the nursery. "I mean, I do know a few things about keeping ladies happy, Kurt. And we have similar tastes, I'm sure you can see that. How about I tell you what I'd do to Jane, and you can learn a few things."

"Don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way out." Kurt pushes him out into the hallway. Conor, Tasha, Stonebridge, Patty, and Sarah quickly follow. Kurt slams the door in their faces. 

"That was…" Conor searches for a word. "Something."

"Do you think they realize Allie's still in there?" Tasha asks as they all start heading towards the stairs. 

"They'll figure it out soon enough if they don't." Sarah points out. "No one say anything else about it. We're just going to pretend none of that happened and no one's ever going to mention it around me again. If you do, you'll be the ones paying for my therapy."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One chapter left! (Bwahahahaha)


	7. I Think It's More of a 'I Hope You Don't Go Blind' Sort of Situation

"Sorry, Tash." Reade shoots her an apologetic look as he holds out his hand to Sarah.

She waves off his apology. "No worries, go dance, have fun." 

It's not like she really wanted to dance anyhow. She's more than perfectly okay with taking the opportunity to actually sit down for more than three seconds, and she might even be able to finish half her supper before the song's over; she knows that Kurt had picked a long one for this dance.

Scott steps in front of her before she can take the first bite. "Come dance with me, honey."

"It's supposed to just be for people in the wedding party." She answers.

"Yeah, well, Kurtie should have made sure to have equal numbers then. It's not my fault he can't count, and it's not yours either. Come on. You're a bridesmaid, you're supposed to be dancing." He takes her hand before she has a chance to think about it. 

"Okay, fine." She wads up her napkin and throws it on her seat with her free hand as he pulls her out onto the dance floor. "But put your hands anywhere they're not wanted, and you're going to lose them in a very painful not-accident."

"Fair enough." He spins her out and then back in, adjusting his grip on her when she does. His right hand is very carefully placed on her back, high enough that she couldn't possibly complain about it. He knows the steps, and doesn't step on her toes. He doesn't say a word, which is almost more than she thought possible. 

The silence finally gets to a point where it's too awkward for her to deal with. "Thank you," she mutters reluctantly. 

"Like I said, I couldn't let you just sit there like the prettiest little wallflower." He winks at her, then pulls her in just slightly closer. 

It's not enough to raise a fuss about, but she does raise a questioning eyebrow. 

Scott laughs. "I promise I'm not making a move. You've made it perfectly clear that you don't want to hear it. Someone else has made it clear you're not to be hit on, either. Hint taken. I just didn't want us to be the most awkward dancers out here."

"No, we wouldn't want that." She laughs too. "Besides, that has to be Patty and Sawyer."

They both look over at the best man and maid of honor and wince. Sawyer doesn't have a clue how to waltz and won't even look at Patterson as he blunders about; Patterson looks almost as miserable, towering over her partner in her heels, trying to make small talk with little success. 

"Seriously, what was Kurtie thinking, making a thirteen-year-old his best man?" Scott asks. "I understand he loves Sawyer, we all do, but come on, dude. Can you explain it to me?" 

She scoffs. "Not exactly. Something about how it would have been Reade, but Reade insisted that in that case, Sarah had to be the maid of honor, and then Jane got upset and it was this whole big thing. I still don't know how Sawyer came out the loser in that fight, and I don't want to know."

"How mad would Patty be if I cut in and rescued her?" Scott's tone is light, but Tasha can tell it's a serious question. 

"Go for it." She has to tell him the truth, now that she's no longer furious at him on Allie's behalf; a week and a long talk with Als later, it's all whiskey under the bridge in her opinion. "Patty would be absolutely thrilled. Your problem's going to be with Jane and Kurt. Kurt seems to think he's Patty's protector, and Jane's going to be mad if you cause a scene on the dance floor."

Scott looks over at Jane. "Okay, yeah, Patty's just going to have to tough it out with the little fucker for a bit longer. I'm still sore in places I didn't know I could be sore after Jane invited me to spar on Wednesday. Fuck me, but she whipped my ass. I know I'm good, that's not even bragging but simple truth, but it's like she's not even fucking human."

"She might still be a little bit mad at you." Tasha tells the tiniest little white lie; Jane's still pissed about the bachelorette party incident and Kurt's hurt feelings. She's probably going to stay angry for the next year, or however long it takes for Kurt to stop clinging to Bee like he's been doing this last week. "Spar with her again when she's had time to calm down."

"No thanks, I'll pass." He looks over her head at the rest of the wedding guests, then back down at her. "I have to ask…" Scott trails off. 

Tasha can't even imagine what he could possibly be thinking that would cause him of all people to think twice before saying it. 

"If you think Patty would be okay with me cutting in on one of her dances and claiming her attention, would you want someone to cut in on this dance?" He finally comes up with what appears to be a highly edited version of what he's been thinking. 

"Huh?" Tasha knows she's not the most eloquent speaker at times. "I mean, you're not that bad now that you've stopped hitting on me nonstop. I'm not exactly in need of rescue right now."

He laughs again. "If I've been playing wingman and Mikey were to come over right now, how mad would you be? I'm thinking not at all, am I right? I bet you wouldn't even tell him to watch where he puts his hands, or maybe you would, but only in a you want him to grab your ass sort of way." 

She blushes, and he laughs even louder. 

\- - - - - - - - - - 

Tasha finally gets a chance to take a break after dancing with Kurt and Bee, Reade, Allie, Conor twice, Patterson, Jane, and Scott again. Despite Scott's near-constant teasing at this point, Stonebridge still hasn't asked her to dance, so she figures it's a case of Scott being a little troll and trying to stir up shit rather than he'd been serious about being his partner's wingman. 

"That's hilarious." Conor points his fork in the direction of the dance floor, where Jane and Scott are dancing now. 

At least, Tasha thinks "dancing" is the right word. It might be more accurately described as some sort semi-elegant, synchronized fight. Scott's hand keeps moving lower and lower, while Jane keeps readjusting it and stepping on his foot. Tasha would bet anything that Jane's not doing it accidentally either. They whirl by close enough that they she and Conor can hear the ongoing argument. 

"I'm going to count to one, and then I'm going to start breaking fingers." Jane sounds completely exasperated. 

"Should someone do something about that?" Conor asks, digging back into his cake like he's unconcerned about the threat of violence. "And by someone, I mean someone other than me, because this is beautifully entertaining and I'm not going to break it up. Plus, I have cake. It's all copacetic."

"Eh." Tasha steals a bite of his cake too, watching as Scott moves his hand back up, getting a good grope out of the movement. "He's been warned, he knows the risks he's taking. Not my problem."

"So you two…" Conor trails off, but gestures his fork around in an obscene way.

She hadn't even known that it was possible to wave a fork obscenely until that little demonstration. "Have you completely lost your mind?" Tasha hisses at him. "Of course not. No way. Put that fork down before you poke someone's eye out or have to explain to Sarah why Sawyer saw that."

"Just asking. You wouldn't be the first one of Kurt's ex-lovers to take up with him." Conor turns back to watch the dancing, eyes following Kurt and Allie spinning around the dance floor with Bee held in between them. 

Tasha stares at him for a minute, trying to figure out his angle. She knows for a fact that he doesn't give a damn about Allie sleeping with Kurt or Scott; Tasha had asked him about it, and his philosophy on it was that everyone has a past, he couldn't possibly find a fuck to give about something that had happened before he and Allie got together. He definitely doesn't have any say in who she does or does not do. It's not until she sees him glance over at Stonebridge and Patterson that she figures it out. "You gossip, you!"

He shrugs. "No one's drunk enough for a little in tequila veritas like at the hen party, so I can't possibly hope for everyone to just start blurting out all sorts of little secrets and truths. And no one in your little coven wants to voluntarily tell me what's going on, so I figured, what's the harm in just asking?" 

"So when I don’t tell you anything, what's your big plan then?" She knows he won't be able to drop it. 

"Give Patty another glass of champagne or three, wait for it to kick in, and ask her to tell me about how 'pretty' Scott is." Conor grins at her. 

Tasha just rolls her eyes. "You're a bigger shit-stirrer than Reade. Congrats." She intones sarcastically. 

"Tasha?" Stonebridge interrupts them. "Would you…"

Conor answers for her before Stonebridge can even finish the question. "She sure would." 

"Oh, for fuck's sake, Con! You don't even know what he was going to say!" She scolds. 

"Clearly, he was about to ask you to either dance or go fool around in the coat room like a proper bridesmaid would already be doing. Either way, the answer's yes. Go!" Conor demands. "Tell me all about it later!"

She just shakes her head, but does let Stonebridge lead her out onto the dance floor. 

\- - - - - - - - - -

"Tasha!" Allie yells out. "Tasha! Wherever you're hiding, if you can hear me, get your ass out here, it's about time for Jane to throw her fucking bouquet so we can all go the fuck home already!"

"I probably should go." Tasha murmurs as she pulls back from Stonebridge. 

"Or you could stay." He suggests, pulling her closer. "Jane has a good arm on her, she doesn't need help tossing a handful of flowers."

Tasha quietly laughs. "If I don't come out, Allie's going to start a search party, do we really want that?" 

"Tash!" Allie shrieks again. "I know you haven't left, your fucking shoes and purse are still at the head table! Tasha, can you hear me?!"

Stonebridge kisses her again, and she doesn't even care if Als does find her; she already knows she's going to be teased relentlessly for this anyhow. 

"Oh, Tash!" Allie's getting louder, and Tasha can't be certain if she's just increased the volume or if she's getting closer to finding their hiding place. 

"I've really got to go, Allie's going to have an aneurysm." She straightens out her dress. "To be resumed later?" 

He nods in assent, and she runs her thumb over his lips, removing the last traces of her gloss that linger there before she slides out of the darkened little room he'd scouted for them in the back of the kitchen. She'd kicked off the heels and slipped on a pair of back-up ballet flats because the heels had been hurting her too badly to dance in any longer, and she's glad she did – she's able to sneak completely out of the kitchen and into the empty ladies' room without making a sound. She waits for Allie to start screaming again, and then makes as much noise as she can flushing a toilet and running the sink before barging out of the bathroom as loudly as she can. 

"There you are!" Allie comes running over. "I've been looking everywhere!" 

Tasha takes a gamble on it. "Clearly not everywhere. Did you even think to look in the bathroom?"

"Well, no." Allie admits. "Actually, I sent Patty to look for you fifteen minutes ago, and she never came back. I kinda assumed that the toilet would have been the first place she looked."

"So where's Patty then?" Tasha knows for a fact that Patterson wasn't in the ladies' room or the kitchen, and this seems like a great way from distracting Allie as to what she's actually been doing.

They look at each other and Allie sighs. "What is it with the women in this wedding party not being able to keep their panties on? Why am I the only one of us not having sex during this boring-ass reception?" She bemoans. "Tasha, I've become the responsible one." She sounds completely horrified. "The responsible one! Me. Me, of all people! God help us all."

"My panties were on!" Tasha would never be so tacky as to have sex during the reception. 

"Then you've managed to invent an entirely new way to piss." Allie challenges. She eyes Tasha suspiciously, then kicks the door open to the ladies' room. There's no one in there. "Huh. I thought for sure I was going to catch Stonebridge hiding in there waiting for us to leave. I'm oddly disappointed in you."

"Why would you even think something like that?" Tash demands; she's somewhat insulted that Allie thinks that they'd be so stupid as to pick such a public hiding spot, but she knows Allie won't take the question that way.

Allie shrugs. "The way you two were dancing and then you disappeared and he trailed after you less than two minutes later? Seemed like an easy assumption to make. Then, I had to interrupt Jane and Kurt just to get this reception back on track so we can get out of here sometime today. Then I walked in on Sarah and Reade while I was looking for you and Patty. Ten to one, when we find her, she's going to be playing strip Parcheesi with my not-baby-daddy. Fuck you all, I'm going to start super-gluing everyone's panties in place and your skirts down. New rule, if I'm not getting fucked during a dress-up event, you people aren't either!"

Tasha starts cackling. 

Allie flips her off. "Help me look for Patty."

"Uh, hell no." Tasha shakes her head. "I think you're right about what you're going to find, and no thanks. I'll go babysit the newlyweds, that's a shitty job too."

Allie looks torn. "You're right, that's really bad too." She hesitates for a few seconds. "Don't ever say I never do anything for you. Tell Kurt that if he doesn't behave that I'm going to tell everyone about Disney. I'll climb right up on the head table and commandeer a microphone. Right in front of Sarah and Sawyer. That should scare him into submission for long enough for us to get this dog and pony show back on schedule."

"Disney?" Tasha has to ask. 

Allie shakes her head. "You really don't want to know. Just tell him that, and he should be able to help you keep Jane in line. She's horny as all fuck, but she can keep it together for another few minutes. Believe me when I tell you that marriage has already mostly definitely been consummated." She takes a deep breath. "Okay, I just need to go stop Patty and the manwhore from fornicating. I can do this. I've got this."

"Is this one of those cases where I wish you good luck or tell you to break a leg?" Tash isn't sure which one is proper. 

"While 'break a leg' is always an option when Scott's involved, I think it's more of a 'I hope you don't go blind' sort of situation." Allie snarks. "Right back at you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Es finito! Thanks for sticking with me to the end!


End file.
